title: JSON & Rails: How to remove array brackets inside keypath of JSON results
body: <p>I've got a JSON formatting question -- essentially I'm just trying to remove the array [ ] around the objects inside the keypath that are returned from the Rails controller: </p>
  
  <pre><code># channels controller
    def index
      @channels = Channel.all
  
      respond_to do |format|
        format.html # index.html.erb
        format.json { render :json =&gt; { :channels =&gt; @channels } }
      end
    end
  
  # channels.rb
    def as_json(options={})
      { self.id =&gt; self.attributes }
    end
  
  # returns this JSON:
  {"channels":[{"78":{"id":78,"name":"Zombie Bass","created_at":"2012-03-21T04:04:36Z","updated_at":"2012-04-20T01:21:12Z","num_of_listeners":1}},{"82":{"id":82,"name":"The Beatles123","created_at":"2012-03-22T20:28:34Z","updated_at":"2012-04-17T04:34:07Z","num_of_listeners":1}},{"125":{"id":125,"name":"New!","created_at":"2012-04-19T04:05:47Z","updated_at":"2012-04-19T04:05:47Z","num_of_listeners":1}},{"132":{"id":132,"name":"Test!","created_at":"2012-04-26T21:00:30Z","updated_at":"2012-04-26T21:00:30Z","num_of_listeners":1}}]}
  
  # I want this JSON (just remove the array around all the channels):
  {"channels":{"78":{"id":78,"name":"Zombie Bass","created_at":"2012-03-21T04:04:36Z","updated_at":"2012-04-20T01:21:12Z","num_of_listeners":1}},{"82":{"id":82,"name":"The Beatles123","created_at":"2012-03-22T20:28:34Z","updated_at":"2012-04-17T04:34:07Z","num_of_listeners":1}},{"125":{"id":125,"name":"New!","created_at":"2012-04-19T04:05:47Z","updated_at":"2012-04-19T04:05:47Z","num_of_listeners":1}},{"132":{"id":132,"name":"Test!","created_at":"2012-04-26T21:00:30Z","updated_at":"2012-04-26T21:00:30Z","num_of_listeners":1}}}
  </code></pre>