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POA type of generic list deserialization class?
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  1. POA type of generic list deserialization class?
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    copied!<p>OK, so here's the story so far.</p> <p>I could already deserialize individual objects using <code>XmlSerializer</code>, but deserializing lists was proving to be a real headache. I started out by trying to serialize <code>List&lt;Foo&gt;</code> and the serializer serialized multiple <code>&lt;Foo&gt;</code> XML structures inside a root <code>&lt;ArrayOfFoo&gt;</code> element. That proved to be problematic to deserialize, so it looks like I needed to have defined the 'ArrayOfFoo' element myself. So, I've got a class working that is a 'wrapper' for the list, as shown in this program:</p> <pre><code>using System; using System.IO; using System.Collections.Generic; using System.Xml.Serialization; namespace XmlTester2 { public class Program { static void Main(string[] args) { Console.WriteLine("XML tester..."); string xml = "&lt;ItemList xmlns:i=\"http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance\"&gt;" + "&lt;Person i:type=\"PersonI2\"&gt;" + "&lt;Field1&gt;field1Val&lt;/Field1&gt;" + "&lt;Field2&gt;field2Val&lt;/Field2&gt;" + "&lt;Field3&gt;field3Val&lt;/Field3&gt;" + "&lt;Field4&gt;field4Val&lt;/Field4&gt;" + "&lt;/Person&gt;" + "&lt;Account i:type=\"AccountI2\"&gt;" + "&lt;Field1&gt;field1Val&lt;/Field1&gt;" + "&lt;Field2&gt;field2Val&lt;/Field2&gt;" + "&lt;Field3&gt;field3Val&lt;/Field3&gt;" + "&lt;Field4&gt;field4Val&lt;/Field4&gt;" + "&lt;/Account&gt;" + "&lt;Person i:type=\"PersonI2\"&gt;" + "&lt;Field1&gt;field1Val&lt;/Field1&gt;" + "&lt;Field2&gt;field2Val&lt;/Field2&gt;" + "&lt;Field3&gt;field3Val&lt;/Field3&gt;" + "&lt;Field4&gt;field4Val&lt;/Field4&gt;" + "&lt;/Person&gt;" + "&lt;/ItemList&gt;"; XmlSerializer ser = new XmlSerializer(typeof(ItemList)); using (var reader = new StringReader(xml)) { ItemList result = (ItemList)ser.Deserialize(reader); } Console.WriteLine("Break here and check 'result' in Quickwatch..."); Console.ReadKey(); } } [XmlRootAttribute(IsNullable = false)] public class ItemList { [XmlElementAttribute("Person")] public List&lt;Person&gt; Persons { get; set; } [XmlElementAttribute("Account")] public List&lt;Account&gt; Accounts { get; set; } } [XmlTypeAttribute(AnonymousType = false, TypeName = "Person", Namespace = "")] [XmlInclude(typeof(PersonI2))] public class Person { public string Field1 { get; set; } public string Field2 { get; set; } public string Field3 { get; set; } } [XmlTypeAttribute(AnonymousType = false, TypeName = "PersonI2", Namespace = "")] public class PersonI2 : Person { public string Field4 { get; set; } } [XmlTypeAttribute(AnonymousType = false, TypeName = "Account", Namespace = "")] [XmlInclude(typeof(AccountI2))] public class Account { public string Field1 { get; set; } public string Field2 { get; set; } public string Field3 { get; set; } } [XmlTypeAttribute(AnonymousType = false, TypeName = "AccountI2", Namespace = "")] public class AccountI2 : Account { public string Field4 { get; set; } } } </code></pre> <p>However, this 'wrapper', <code>ItemList</code>, still has to have manually defined in it all the elements that might be contained (in the example, Person and Account). What would be really ideal would be to have a generic list wrapper class. I know this is a bit hopeful, but would there be a way to do this? I'm thinking of something along these lines (this does not work, but is just to give you the general idea):</p> <pre><code>using System; using System.IO; using System.Collections.Generic; using System.Xml.Serialization; namespace XmlTester3 { public class Program { static void Main(string[] args) { Console.WriteLine("XML tester..."); string xml = "&lt;ItemList xmlns:i=\"http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance\"&gt;" + "&lt;Person i:type=\"PersonI2\"&gt;" + "&lt;Field1&gt;field1Val&lt;/Field1&gt;" + "&lt;Field2&gt;field2Val&lt;/Field2&gt;" + "&lt;Field3&gt;field3Val&lt;/Field3&gt;" + "&lt;Field4&gt;field4Val&lt;/Field4&gt;" + "&lt;/Person&gt;" + "&lt;Person i:type=\"PersonI2\"&gt;" + "&lt;Field1&gt;field1Val&lt;/Field1&gt;" + "&lt;Field2&gt;field2Val&lt;/Field2&gt;" + "&lt;Field3&gt;field3Val&lt;/Field3&gt;" + "&lt;Field4&gt;field4Val&lt;/Field4&gt;" + "&lt;/Person&gt;" + "&lt;/ItemList&gt;"; XmlSerializer ser = new XmlSerializer(typeof(ItemList&lt;Person&gt;)); using (var reader = new StringReader(xml)) { ItemList&lt;Person&gt; result = (ItemList&lt;Person&gt;)ser.Deserialize(reader); } Console.WriteLine("Break here and check 'result' in Quickwatch..."); Console.ReadKey(); } } [XmlRootAttribute(IsNullable = false)] [XmlInclude(typeof(Person))] [XmlInclude(typeof(PersonI2))] [XmlInclude(typeof(Account))] [XmlInclude(typeof(AccountI2))] public class ItemList&lt;T&gt; { [XmlElementAttribute] public List&lt;T&gt; Items { get; set; } } [XmlTypeAttribute(AnonymousType = false, TypeName = "Person", Namespace = "")] [XmlInclude(typeof(PersonI2))] public class Person { public string Field1 { get; set; } public string Field2 { get; set; } public string Field3 { get; set; } } [XmlTypeAttribute(AnonymousType = false, TypeName = "PersonI2", Namespace = "")] public class PersonI2 : Person { public string Field4 { get; set; } } [XmlTypeAttribute(AnonymousType = false, TypeName = "Account", Namespace = "")] [XmlInclude(typeof(AccountI2))] public class Account { public string Field1 { get; set; } public string Field2 { get; set; } public string Field3 { get; set; } } [XmlTypeAttribute(AnonymousType = false, TypeName = "AccountI2", Namespace = "")] public class AccountI2 : Account { public string Field4 { get; set; } } } </code></pre> <p>So, the XML structures passed inside the <code>ItemList</code> would only be able to be of one type, say <code>Person</code> in this example, and I could define an <code>ItemList&lt;Person&gt;</code> that would allow me to deserialize a list containing multiple Person objects? Any ideas? If necessary, I wouldn't mind having to tag the <code>ItemList</code> class with an <code>[XmlInclude...]</code> for every type that <code>ItemList</code> might contain a collection of.</p> <p>I'm guessing this is possible, I just haven't figured out quite how? :-) Or is the default XmlSerializer too fussy?</p>
 

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