Overview

The .NET environment (particularly the 2.0 environment) is extraordinarily powerful. This is particularly true when it comes to serialization. Serialization and deserialization refers to the process of transforming an object in memory into another form, often using XML and a stream of some kind and then turning it back into an in memory object from a stream.

A Simple Example

Lets say we have the following class:

CSharp
public class Person { public Person() { } public string Name; public string SSN; }
VB
Public Class Person Public Sub New() End Sub Public Name As String Public SSN As String End Class

An object of this type could be represented by the following XML:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-16"?> <Person xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema"> <Name>EJ Alexandra</Name> <SSN>123-45-6789</SSN> </Person>

Actual Implementation Sample/Example

Luckily for us, .NET provides a class called XmlSerializer that will do this for us. In fact, this suite of tools can serialize virtually any object and then de-serializer it afterwards. This article will focus on a simple serializer/deserializer. The following code will serialize a simple person object.

CSharp
// Create a person Person p = new Person(); p.Name = "EJ Alexandra"; p.SSN = "123-45-6789"; // Create the xml serializer XmlSerializer serializer = new XmlSerializer(p.GetType()); // Create a stream to write the XML to StringWriter sw = new StringWriter(); // Serialize the object serializer.Serialize(sw, p); // Cose the stream sw.Close(); // Save the XML as a string string XML = sw.GetStringBuilder().ToString();
VB
' Create a person Dim p As Person = New Person() p.Name = "EJ Alexandra" p.SSN = "123-45-6789" ' Create the xml serializer Dim serializer As XmlSerializer = New XmlSerializer(p.GetType()) ' Create a stream to write the XML to Dim sw As StringWriter = New StringWriter() ' Serialize the object serializer.Serialize(sw, p) ' Cose the stream sw.Close() ' Save the XML as a string Dim XML As String = sw.GetStringBuilder().ToString()

This XML can be transformed back into a Person object, using the following code:

CSharp
// Create a string reader to read the XML StringReader sr = new StringReader(XML); // De-serialize the person from the stream Person personFromStream = (Person)serializer.Deserialize(sr);
VB
' Create a string reader to read the XML Dim sr As StringReader = New StringReader(XML) ' De-serialize the person from the stream Dim personFromStream As Person = CType(serializer.Deserialize(sr), Person)

Conclusion

Once an object has been serialized, it can be stored in a database, transmitted to distant sister-applications across the office or across the world. This is an extremely powerful technology with a wide range of uses.

We will be providing more detailed articles on serializing objects over the next few weeks/months.

Complete File Source Code

default.aspx

<%@ Page Language="C#" AutoEventWireup="true" CodeFile="Default.aspx.cs" Inherits="_Default" %> <!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"> <html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" > <head runat="server"> <title>Untitled Page</title> </head> <body> <form id="form1" runat="server"> <div> <asp:Label ID="Label1" runat="server" Text="Label"></asp:Label></div> </form> </body> </html>

default.aspx.cs/vb

CSharp
using System; using System.Data; using System.Configuration; using System.Web; using System.Web.Security; using System.Web.UI; using System.Web.UI.WebControls; using System.Web.UI.WebControls.WebParts; using System.Web.UI.HtmlControls; using System.Xml.Serialization; using System.IO; public class Person { public Person() { } public string Name; public string SSN; } public partial class _Default : System.Web.UI.Page { protected void Page_Load(object sender, EventArgs e) { // Create a person Person p = new Person(); p.Name = "EJ Alexandra"; p.SSN = "123-45-6789"; // Create the xml serializer XmlSerializer serializer = new XmlSerializer(p.GetType()); // Create a stream to write the XML to StringWriter sw = new StringWriter(); // Serialize the object serializer.Serialize(sw, p); // Cose the stream sw.Close(); // Save the XML as a string string XML = sw.GetStringBuilder().ToString(); // Show the XML on the page Label1.Text = String.Format("<h1>XML</h1><pre>{0}</pre>", HttpUtility.HtmlEncode(XML)); // Create a string reader to read the XML StringReader sr = new StringReader(XML); // De-serialize the person from the stream Person personFromStream = (Person)serializer.Deserialize(sr); Label1.Text += String.Format("<h1>From Xml</h1>Name: {0}", personFromStream.Name); } }
VB
Imports System Imports System.Data Imports System.Configuration Imports System.Web Imports System.Web.Security Imports System.Web.UI Imports System.Web.UI.WebControls Imports System.Web.UI.WebControls.WebParts Imports System.Web.UI.HtmlControls Imports System.Xml.Serialization Imports System.IO Public Class Person Public Sub New() End Sub Public Name As String Public SSN As String End Class Public partial Class _Default Inherits System.Web.UI.Page Protected Sub Page_Load(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As EventArgs) ' Create a person Dim p As Person = New Person() p.Name = "EJ Alexandra" p.SSN = "123-45-6789" ' Create the xml serializer Dim serializer As XmlSerializer = New XmlSerializer(p.GetType()) ' Create a stream to write the XML to Dim sw As StringWriter = New StringWriter() ' Serialize the object serializer.Serialize(sw, p) ' Cose the stream sw.Close() ' Save the XML as a string Dim XML As String = sw.GetStringBuilder().ToString() ' Show the XML on the page Label1.Text = String.Format("<h1>XML</h1><pre>{0}</pre>", HttpUtility.HtmlEncode(XML)) ' Create a string reader to read the XML Dim sr As StringReader = New StringReader(XML) ' De-serialize the person from the stream Dim personFromStream As Person = CType(serializer.Deserialize(sr), Person) Label1.Text += String.Format("<h1>From Xml</h1>Name: {0}", personFromStream.Name) End Sub End Class

XML<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-16"?>
<Person xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema">
  <Name>EJ Alexandra</Name>
  <SSN>123-45-6789</SSN>
</Person>

From Xml

Name: EJ Alexandra

'----------------------------------------------------------------
' Converted from C# to VB .NET using CSharpToVBConverter(1.2).
' Developed by: Kamal Patel (http://www.KamalPatel.net)
'----------------------------------------------------------------



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