# \[IGN-16202\] Reading document tag with array of objects fails to convert to JSON

**URL:** <https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/ign-16202-reading-document-tag-with-array-of-objects-fails-to-convert-to-json/115450>\
**Category:** Ignition\
**Created:** [May 8, 2026, 6:31am UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/ign-16202-reading-document-tag-with-array-of-objects-fails-to-convert-to-json/115450 "2026-05-08T06:31:07Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![nminchin](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/user_avatar/forum.inductiveautomation.com/nminchin/32/6911_2.png) [@nminchin](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/nminchin)\
**Post date:** [May 8, 2026, 6:31am UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/ign-16202-reading-document-tag-with-array-of-objects-fails-to-convert-to-json/115450/1 "2026-05-08T06:31:07Z")

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v8.3.3

I'm not sure what's happening here, but encoding this document tag to JSON yields a bizarre result:

 ![image](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/original/3X/e/b/ebd433e3c3c232d59389708f565250a390c5309c.png)

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**Author:** ![pturmel](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/user_avatar/forum.inductiveautomation.com/pturmel/32/3295_2.png) [@pturmel](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/pturmel)\
**Post date:** [May 8, 2026, 11:22am UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/ign-16202-reading-document-tag-with-array-of-objects-fails-to-convert-to-json/115450/2 "2026-05-08T11:22:07Z")

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Documents tags (and Vision document props) can hold arrays and primitive values in addition to objects. But anything other than a dictionary/map at the root confuses the document editor.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![osolorzano](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/inductiveautomation/user_avatar/forum.inductiveautomation.com/osolorzano/32/6432_2.png) [@osolorzano](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/osolorzano)\
**Post date:** [May 8, 2026, 5:30pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/ign-16202-reading-document-tag-with-array-of-objects-fails-to-convert-to-json/115450/3 "2026-05-08T17:30:13Z")

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Created an internal ticket to address this. Sadly, there doesn't seem to be any good workarounds that I found either.

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**Author:** ![Nol](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Nol](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/u/Nol)\
**Post date:** [May 8, 2026, 5:55pm UTC](https://forum.inductiveautomation.com/t/ign-16202-reading-document-tag-with-array-of-objects-fails-to-convert-to-json/115450/4 "2026-05-08T17:55:32Z")

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I don't have 8.3 handy but does this work?

```python
doc_val = system.tag.readBlocking([tp])[0].value
py_obj = system.util.jsonDecode(str(doc_val))
final_json = system.util.jsonEncode(py_obj)

```