# Can a mender-client inventory attribute value be a json file? **URL:** \ **Category:** General Discussions\ **Created:** [June 30, 2021, 9:39am UTC](https://hub.mender.io/t/can-a-mender-client-inventory-attribute-value-be-a-json-file/3811 "2021-06-30T09:39:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 3\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![salma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/fbc32d/32.png) [@salma](https://hub.mender.io/u/salma)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2021, 9:39am UTC](https://hub.mender.io/t/can-a-mender-client-inventory-attribute-value-be-a-json-file/3811/1 "2021-06-30T09:39:08Z")
Hello everyone, I’m looking to add a new attribute to the mender client inventory, to keep an eye on the list of packages installed in device with the info about packages. Since there are a lot of information to be reported, I want to store it in a json file and then update the inventory with the json file. I want to ask if there is a way to do so instead of directly printing the info? ---
**Author:** ![drewmoseley](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex036/user_avatar/hub.mender.io/drewmoseley/32/47_2.png) [@drewmoseley](https://hub.mender.io/u/drewmoseley)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2021, 8:13pm UTC](https://hub.mender.io/t/can-a-mender-client-inventory-attribute-value-be-a-json-file/3811/2 "2021-06-30T20:13:03Z")
At the moment inventory is strictly a text string with format `KEY=VALUE`. Potentially the VALUE field could be JSON but I’m not sure whether what would cause parsing errors on the server. Certainly it would be poorly formatted in the Web UI. Drew ---
**Author:** ![dellgreen](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex036/user_avatar/hub.mender.io/dellgreen/32/85_2.png) [@dellgreen](https://hub.mender.io/u/dellgreen)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2021, 9:25pm UTC](https://hub.mender.io/t/can-a-mender-client-inventory-attribute-value-be-a-json-file/3811/3 "2021-06-30T21:25:16Z")
I have been using JSON arrays values to my key/value pairs in inventory for several years now and they display fine in the UI.