Using XmlSerializer with private and public const properties

Question

What is the easiest way to force the XmlSerializer to also serialize the private and "public const" properties of a class or structure? The right is not all that he will deduce for me, these are things that are only public. Creating it private or adding const causes the values ​​to not be serialized.

Answer 1

XmlSerializer considers only open fields and properties. If you need more control, you can implement IXmlSerializable and serialize whatever you want. Of course, serializing a constant does not make much sense, since you cannot deserialize a constant.

Answer 2

Even if it is not possible to serialize private properties, you can serialize properties using an internal setter, for example:

 public string Foo { get; internal set; } 

To do this, you need to pre-generate the serializing assembly using sgen.exe and declare this assembly as a friend:

 [assembly:InternalsVisibleTo("MyAssembly.XmlSerializers")] 

Answer 3

Check out the DataContractSerializer introduced in .NET 3.0. It also uses the XML format, and in many ways is better than the XmlSerializer, including private data processing. See http://www.danrigsby.com/blog/index.php/2008/03/07/xmlserializer-vs-datacontractserializer-serialization-in-wcf/ for a full comparison.

If you have only .NET 2.0, there is a BinarySerializer that can handle private data, but, of course, this is a binary format.

Answer 4

It makes no sense to consider const members, since they are not instances; but if you just mean non-public instance members: consider a DataContractSerializer (.NET 3.0) - this is similar to the XmlSerializer , but it can serialize non-public properties (although this is a "select").

See more details.

Answer 5

Another solution is to use Newtonsoft.Json:

  var json = Newtonsoft.Json.JsonConvert.SerializeObject(new { root = result }); var xml = (XmlDocument)Newtonsoft.Json.JsonConvert.DeserializeXmlNode(json); 

Of course, this one unfortunately bypasses through json.

Answer 6

Here is my decision to put immutable values ​​in a property that will be serialized in XML:

 [XmlElement] public string format { get { return "Acme Order Detail XML v3.4.5"; } set { } }