JMeter - Parsing REST API JSON Response Data for Subsequent HTTP Requests

I used JMeter recently to do performance testing on a REST API backend application that returns JSON data.  We needed to retrieve the id of the created object to use in subsequent HTTP calls.  This is one way to do it:

Environment:
Jmeter 2.12
java version "1.8.0_66"
Windows 7

The example steps below will use the following JSON response data
[
{
"id" : 88
}, {
"id" : 99
}
]

Steps:

1. Grab the minimal-json jar from maven central here:
   https://mvnrepository.com/artifact/com.eclipsesource.minimal-json/minimal-json/0.9.1
   
2. Put the minimal-json-0.9.1.jar file in your <jemeter_home>/lib folder and restart jmeter
3. Use Jmeter's Bean Shell Post Processor to parse the JSON response data:
   
   To retrieve the first id in the JsonArray, put this in the Script section:

   import com.eclipsesource.json.JsonArray;
   import com.eclipsesource.json.JsonObject;
   
   String jsonString = prev.getResponseDataAsString();
   
   JsonArray jsonArray = JsonArray.readFrom(jsonString);
   JsonObject jsonObject = jsonArray.get(0).asObject();
   
   int id = jsonObject.get("id").asInt();
   log.info("*****************id" + id);
   
   // Set the Test Plan's user defined variable named SAVED_ID, the variable doesn't have to exist already
   vars.put("SAVED_ID", id.toString());
   

   
   
   
   
   
   
4. Now, for subsequent HTTP calls the SAVED_ID will have the value of the object created.
5. NOTE:  Using an Aggregate Report will show how many successful or failed HTTP calls.  Using a Response Time Graph will show response time in a span of the elapsed time.
   
   

These articles were helpful:
* http://eclipsesource.com/blogs/2014/06/12/parsing-json-responses-with-jmeter/
* http://eclipsesource.com/blogs/2013/04/18/minimal-json-parser-for-java/