Parse JSON output into a ListView

public class JsonExampleActivity extends ListActivity {
    /** Called when the activity is first created. */
    @Override
    public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
        //setContentView(R.layout.main);
        setListAdapter(new ArrayAdapter(this, android.R.layout.simple_list_item_1, this.fetchTwitterPublicTimeline()));
    }

    public ArrayList<String> fetchTwitterPublicTimeline()
    {
        ArrayList<String> listItems = new ArrayList<String>();

        try {
            URL twitter = new URL("your url here");

            URLConnection tc = twitter.openConnection();
            BufferedReader in = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(
                    tc.getInputStream()));

            String line;
            while ((line = in.readLine()) != null) {
                  JSONObject ja = new JSONObject(line);
              /*
                //for (int i = 0; i < ja.length(); i++) {
                    JSONObject jo = ja.getJSONObject("_api_error");
                    listItems.add(jo.getString("name"));*/

                    JSONArray jobj=ja.getJSONArray("artists");
                    //JSONArray ja = new JSONArray(line);
                for (int i = 0; i < jobj.length(); i++) {
                    JSONObject jo = jobj.getJSONObject(i);
                    listItems.add(jo.getString("artist_name"));
                }
               // }
            }
        } catch (MalformedURLException e) {
            // TODO Auto-generated catch block
            e.printStackTrace();
        } catch (IOException e) {
            // TODO Auto-generated catch block
            e.printStackTrace();
        } catch (JSONException e) {
            // TODO Auto-generated catch block
            e.printStackTrace();
        }
        return listItems;
    }
}

Simplest thing that I would do is to put JSONArray in some ArrayList and use it in arrayadapter

You can add all json objects into a list, and then load list from there on, but as you have prepared a method which returns a single string. you can use following:

Use

String[] tokens=returnString.split("\n\r");
ArrayAdapter adapter=new ArrayAdapter(this, android.R.layout.simple_list_item_1, tokens);
listView.setAdapter(adapter);

take a list of string and store the ContactName in that

setListAdapter(new ArrayAdapter<String>(this, R.layout.list_item, returnString)); 

here returnString will be of arraylist.

make getServerData return arraylist.

Learn the Basics of an Custom Adapter then...

Whenever you want to do processing with the views in a ListView you need to create a custom adapter that will handle your logic implementation and pass that information to the views as necessary.

I'd make sure you are making your requests in a background thread(eg async task or intent service) or your app may crash if it takes to long.

As for the list activity

http://www.vogella.de/articles/AndroidListView/article.html

This tutorial will show you how to create a custom model and populate it into a list view with custom xml.