This is an error traceback from a Python script, and...

August 27, 2025 at 04:34 PM

 Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "C:\Users\balexander\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python312\Lib\site-packages\requests\models.py", line 974, in json
    return complexjson.loads(self.text, **kwargs)
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "C:\Users\balexander\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python312\Lib\json\__init__.py", line 346, in loads
    return _default_decoder.decode(s)
           ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "C:\Users\balexander\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python312\Lib\json\decoder.py", line 341, in decode
    raise JSONDecodeError("Extra data", s, end)
json.decoder.JSONDecodeError: Extra data: line 1 column 16 (char 15)

During handling of the above exception, another exception occurred:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "c:\Users\balexander\Documents\Handy Scripts\Get-DuplicateDevicesSentinel1.py", line 15, in <module>
    _agents = _response.json().get("data", [])
              ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
  File "C:\Users\balexander\AppData\Local\Programs\Python\Python312\Lib\site-packages\requests\models.py", line 978, in json
    raise RequestsJSONDecodeError(e.msg, e.doc, e.pos)
requests.exceptions.JSONDecodeError: Extra data: line 1 column 16 (char 15)

This is an error traceback from a Python script, and it details how the program encountered an issue and where the problem occurred. Here's what the code is doing and why the error is being raised:

In the Code

A JSON Parsing Issue:
- The program makes an HTTP request using the requests library.
- It attempts to parse the response from the HTTP request as JSON using the .json() method on the response object (_response).
- Specifically, the line:
```
_agents = _response.json().get("data", [])
```
  tries to decode the JSON response and access the "data" key, defaulting to an empty list if "data" is not present.
Where the Problem Appears:
- The response received from the HTTP request (_response) contains content that is not valid JSON. Specifically, the content seems to contain extraneous data after what would normally be valid JSON.
- This is evidenced by the json.decoder.JSONDecodeError: Extra data: line 1 column 16 (char 15) error.
  - "Extra data" means there is unexpected or additional text in the response after what should be valid JSON.
  - In this case, the JSON parsing library (json.loads) sees something at "line 1 column 16" that isn't valid JSON.
The Exception Cascade:
- The requests library internally uses Python's json library to handle .json(). When the parsing fails, Python raises a JSONDecodeError.
- The requests library catches this and re-raises it as a RequestsJSONDecodeError, which provides more information and context about the HTTP response that caused the issue.

Root Cause of the Error

The error means the server returned a response that:

Is malformed or corrupted as JSON (e.g., has multiple JSON objects without proper separation).
Has additional unexpected content (e.g., HTML or an error message appended to a partial JSON response).
Is not JSON at all, despite the script expecting it to be.

How to Resolve This

To fix or debug this issue:

Inspect the response content:
```
print(_response.text)
```
This will help you understand if the response is valid JSON or contains unexpected data.
Ensure the server is returning the expected format by inspecting its API documentation or verifying the request parameters and headers.

Add error handling to manage cases where the response isn't valid JSON:

try:
    _agents = _response.json().get("data", [])
except requests.exceptions.JSONDecodeError as e:
    print(f"Failed to decode JSON: {e}")
    _agents = []

This will prevent your script from crashing and allow you to log or handle invalid responses gracefully.

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