I have the following XML:
<MyType>
<MyProperty1>Value 1</MyProperty1>
<MyProperty2>Value 2</MyProperty2>
<MyNestedXml>
<h1>Heading</h1>
<p>Lorum</p>
<p>Ipsum</p>
</MyNestedXml>
</MyType>
This can be deserialized to XML in C# by creating classes and adding attributes as below:
[Serializable]
public class MyType
{
[XmlElement("MyProperty1")
public string MyProperty1 { get; set; }
[XmlElement("MyProperty2")
public string MyProperty2 { get; set; }
[XmlIgnore]
public string MyNestedXml { get; set; }
}
However, the inner XML within the <MyNestedXml> element varies and doesn't follow a consistent structure which I can effectively map using attributes.
I don't have control over the XML structure unfortunately.
I have tried using an [XmlElement("MyNestedXml") with an XmlNode type but this results in the first child node being deserialized instead of the entire inner XML.
I have also tried deserializing to a type of string but that throws an InvalidOperationException:
"Unexpected node type Element. ReadElementString method can only be called on elements with simple or empty content."
The problem is that the content of the MyNestedXml element could be an array of Elements sometimes but could be simple or empty content at other times.
Ideally I could use a different serialization attribute such as [XmlAsString] to skip serialization altogether and just assign the inner XML as is.
The intended result would be a class of type MyType having a property MyProperty1 = "Value 1", a property MyProperty2 = "Value 2", and a property MyNestedXml = "<h1>Heading</h1><p>Lorum</p><p>Ipsum</p>".
Make it an XmlElement property with the XmlAnyElement attribute and the serializer will deserialize an arbitrary XML structure.
[XmlRoot("MyType")]
public class MyType
{
[XmlElement("MyProperty1")]
public string MyProperty1 { get; set; }
[XmlElement("MyProperty2")]
public string MyProperty2 { get; set; }
[XmlAnyElement("MyNestedXml")]
public XmlElement MyNestedXml { get; set; }
}
I have managed to solve this...
I created a class to deserialize to:
public class RichText : IXmlSerializable
{
public string Raw { get; set; }
public XmlSchema GetSchema()
{
return null;
}
public void ReadXml(XmlReader reader)
{
Raw = reader.ReadInnerXml();
}
public void WriteXml(XmlWriter writer)
{
writer.WriteString(Raw);
}
}
This allows me to have the following class definition:
[Serializable]
public class MyType
{
[XmlElement("MyProperty1")
public string MyProperty1 { get; set; }
[XmlElement("MyProperty2")
public string MyProperty2 { get; set; }
[XmlElement("MyNestedXml")]
public RichText MyNestedXml { get; set; }
}
I can now use InstanceOfMyType.MyNestedXml.Raw to get the inner XML as string. If I so choose I can override the .ToString() method of RichText to return the Raw property also.
Hope this helps others out in the future.
You're going to have to use an XMLReader if the structure of the XML isn't consistent.
I'd suggest you look at this link for a recursion pattern on how to use an XMLReader. It is probably also going to be the fastest way to parse the XML as well.
Traverse a XML using Recursive function
Related
I'm working with the .NET Serialization support. I need to use the Google Geocoding API to retrieve the results of a geocoding query as XML, and deserialize the XML to a C# class. The problem is, the C# class has a property that matches to an XML element that may or may not be present in the XML stream.
I've looked through the MSDN documentation for XML serialization/deserialization for a way to handle this, but nothing jumps out. Is there a way to specify that an element is optional in the XML stream?
Here is the C# class to contain the deserialized XML:
[XmlRoot]
public class MyGeocodeResponse
{
[XmlElement("status")]
public string Status { get; set; }
[XmlElement("result")]
public Result[] Results { get; set; }
[XmlElement("partial_match")]
public bool PartialMatch { get; set; }
}
The "partial_match" element appears to be optional. When I deserialize some XML that does not have the "partial_match" element, an exception is thrown (InvalidOperationException).
Is there a way to specify that the "partial_match" element may not be present?
Did you try to use DataContract and [DataMember(IsRequired = false) instead?
[DataContract(Namespace ="youNamespace")]
public class MyGeocodeResponse
{
[DataMember(Name="status")]
public string Status { get; set; }
[DataMember(Name="result")]
public Result[] Results { get; set; }
[DataMember(Name="partial_match", IsRequired = false)]
public bool PartialMatch { get; set; }
}
If the element may be present but it may have a Null value, then use this:
[XmlElement("partial_match", IsNullable = true)]
If the element may not be present at all, then do this:
private bool? partialMatch;
[XmlElement("partial_match")]
public bool PartialMatch
{
get { return this.partialMatch; }
set { this.partialMatch = value; this.PartialMatchSpecified = true; }
}
[XmlIgnore]
public bool PartialMatchSpecified { get; set; }
I'm trying to deserialize an XML into a C# object that has numerous elements of the same type. I've pared down the contents for clarity. My C# class looks like this:
[XmlInclude(typeof(RootElement))]
[XmlInclude(typeof(Entry))]
[Serializable, XmlRoot("Form")]
public class DeserializedClass
{
public List<Entry> listEntry;
public RootElement rootElement { get; set; }
}
Then I define the Entry and RootElement classes as follows:
public class RootElement
{
public string rootElementValue1 { get; set; }
public string rootElementValue2 { get; set; }
}
public class Entry
{
public string entryValue1 { get; set; }
public string entryValue2 { get; set; }
}
And the structure of the XML I'm trying to deserialize looks like this:
<Entry property="value">
<entryValue1>Data 1</entryValue1>
<entryValue2>Data 2</entryValue2>
<RootElement>
<rootElementValue1>Data 3</rootElementValue1>
<rootElementValue2>Data 4</rootElementValue2>
</RootElement>
<RootElement>
<rootElementValue1>Data 5</rootElementValue1>
<rootElementValue2>Data 6</rootElementValue2>
</RootElement>
</Entry>
As you can see there will be multiple RootElement elements that I want to deserialize into the List of the C# object. To deserialize I use the following:
XmlSerializer serializer = new XmlSerializer(typeof(DeserializedClass));
using (StringReader reader = new StringReader(xml))
{
DeserializedClass deserialized = (DeserializedClass)serializer.Deserialize(reader);
return deserialized;
}
Any ideas how to fix it?
I tweaked your classes a little bit for your deserialization code to work:
[Serializable, XmlRoot("Entry")]
public class DeserializedClass
{
public string entryValue1;
public string entryValue2;
[XmlElement("RootElement")]
public List<RootElement> rootElement { get; set; }
}
public class RootElement
{
public string rootElementValue1 { get; set; }
public string rootElementValue2 { get; set; }
}
Now it works fine.
I don't know why you declared your XmlRoot as "Form" as there is no element in the XML with that name so I replaced it with "Entry".
You cannot use an Entry class with entryvalue1 and entryvalue2 properties because they are direct children of the root (Event) and there is no child as Entry. In short your classes must reflect the hierarchy of the XML so that deserialization can work properly.
I have xml that is not very well formed, but need to map to a List with RestSharp. I do not have control of the service/ xml output. Thus far, I was able to get around issues with the properties themselves using the DeserializeAs(Name="name")] property. For instance,
public class Physician
{
[DeserializeAs(Name = "personId")]
public string Id { get; set; }
[DeserializeAs(Name = "fName")]
public string FirstName { get; set; }
[DeserializeAs(Name = "lName")]
public string LastName { get; set; }
}
Maps correctly to a list when I have the following xml:
<data>
<physician>
<personId>3325</personId>
<fName>Foo</fName>
<lName>Bar</lName>
</physician>
<physician>
<personId>3342</personId>
<fName>Jane</fName>
<lName>Doe</lName>
</physician>
...
</data>
The function I am using is:
public static List<T> GetListOfEntityType<T>(string url)
{
return Client.Execute<List<T>>(new RestRequest(url)).Data;
}
The problem is that I have xml that looks like this for a number of other requests,
<data>
<row>
<typeId>0</typeId>
<type>Physician</type>
</row>
<row>
<typeId>1</typeId>
<type>Ambulance</type>
</row>
...
</data>
Given it is not very descriptive xml, but I need to map this to a List.
public class OrganizationType
{
public string typeId { get; set; }
public string type { get; set; }
}
https://stackoverflow.com/a/4082046/3443716 somewhat answers this, and it certainly works, but I do not want the model to be named row I tried to do this:
[DeserializeAs(Name = "row")]
public class OrganizationType
{
public string typeId { get; set; }
public string type { get; set; }
}
However RestSharp appers to ignore this attribute entirely. I have been searching a ton and found a few answers that suggest using a custom deserializer, but I have a hard time believing that is the only or easiest option for that matter. Is there some other attribute that I may be missing or is the only option using a custom deserializer?
As another note, I also tried to do something like this and I just get null back....
public class OrganizationType
{
public string typeId { get; set; }
public string type { get; set; }
}
public class OrgTypeCollection
{
[DeserializeAs(Name = "row")]
public List<OrganizationType> Names { get; set; }
}
Thanks to this post, https://stackoverflow.com/a/27643726 I was able to "fork" the RestSharp Deserialzier and create a slightly custom one with the two line modification provided by The Muffin Man as follows
Added this to HandleListDerivative in the RestSharp.Deserializers.XmlDeserializer at line 344.
var attribute = t.GetAttribute<DeserializeAsAttribute>();
if (attribute != null) name = attribute.Name;
That allowed me to as desired add DeserializeAs as follows:
[DeserializeAs(Name = "row")]
public class OrganizationType
{
public string typeId { get; set; }
public string type { get; set; }
}
I am unsure why this is ignored by restsharp, this seems like it would be useful in a number of cases... As a side note, the functionality of creating nested lists is still available as well. Though I haven't run the tests after modification, it appears to do exactly what you would expect. Other than that all you have to do is add the custom handler to rest by callling
Client.AddHandler("application/xml", new CustomXmlDeserializer());
I am learning Servicestack.Text Library as it has some of the best features.I am trying to deserialize XML into one of my DTOs as below;
C# Code:[Relevant Code with Console Application Here]
class Program
{
static void Main(string[] args)
{
string str = "http://static.cricinfo.com/rss/livescores.xml";
WebClient w = new WebClient();
string xml = w.DownloadString(str);
Response rss = xml.FromXml<Response>();
foreach (var item in rss.rss.Channel.item)
{
Console.WriteLine(item.title);
}
Console.Read();
}
}
You can go through the XML file at str[Given in the program]. I have prepared DTOs for the deserialization. They are as below:
public class Response
{
public RSS rss { get; set; }
}
public class RSS
{
public string Version { get; set; }
public ChannelClass Channel { get; set; }
}
public class ChannelClass
{
public string title { get; set; }
public string ttl { get; set; }
public string description { get; set; }
public string link { get; set; }
public string copyright { get; set; }
public string language { get; set; }
public string pubDate { get; set; }
public List<ItemClass> item { get; set; }
}
public class ItemClass
{
public string title { get; set; }
public string link { get; set; }
public string description { get; set; }
public string guid { get; set; }
}
When I run the program, I get an exception as shown below:
So, to change the Element and the namespace, I did following workaround:
I put the DataContractAttribute on my Response class as below:
[DataContract(Namespace = "")]
public class Response
{
public RSS rss { get; set; }
}
I changed the Element name as below by adding following two lines just before deserializing
//To change rss Element to Response as in Exception
xml = xml.Replace("<rss version=\"2.0\">","<Response>");
//For closing tag
xml = xml.Replace("</rss>","</Response>");
But, it gave another exception on the foreach loop as the deserialized rss object was null. So, how should I deserialize it in a proper way using Servicestack.Text?
Note :
I know well how to deserialize with other libraries, I want to do it with ServiceStack only.
TLDR: Use XmlSerializer to deserialize from xml dialects you can't control; ServiceStack is designed for code-first development and can not be adapted to general purpose xml parsing.
ServiceStack.Text does not implement a custom Xml serializer - it uses DataContractSerializer under the hood. FromXml is merely syntactic sugar.
Using DataContractSerializer to parse Xml
As you've noticed, DataContractSerializer is picky about namespaces. One approach is to specify the namespace explicitly on the class, but if you do this, you'll need to specify [DataMember] everywhere since it assumes that if anything is explicit, everything is. You can work around this problem using an assembly-level attribute (e.g. in AssemblyInfo.cs) to declare a default namespace:
[assembly: ContractNamespace("", ClrNamespace = "My.Namespace.Here")]
This solves the namespace issue.
However, you cannot solve 2 other issues with DataContractSerializer:
It will not use attributes (in your case, version)
It requires that collections such as item have both a wrapping name and an element name (something like items and item)
You cannot work around these limitations because DataContractSerializer is not a general-purpose XML parser. It is intended to easily produce and consume an API, not map arbitrary XML onto a .NET datastructure. You will never get it to parse rss; so therefore ServiceStack.Text (which just wraps it) can also not parse it.
Instead, use XmlSerializer.
Using XmlSerializer
This is rather straighforward. You can parse input with something along the lines of:
var serializer = new XmlSerializer(typeof(RSS));
RSS rss = (RSS)serializer.Deserialize(myXmlReaderHere);
The trick is to annotate the various fields such that they match your xml dialect. For example, in your case that would be:
[XmlRoot("rss")]
public class RSS
{
[XmlAttribute]
public string version { get; set; }
public ChannelClass channel { get; set; }
}
public class ChannelClass
{
public string title { get; set; }
public string ttl { get; set; }
public string description { get; set; }
public string link { get; set; }
public string copyright { get; set; }
public string language { get; set; }
public string pubDate { get; set; }
[XmlElement]
public List<ItemClass> item { get; set; }
}
public class ItemClass
{
public string title { get; set; }
public string link { get; set; }
public string description { get; set; }
public string guid { get; set; }
}
So some judicious attributes suffice to get it to parse the XML as you want.
In summary: you cannot use ServiceStack for this since it uses DataContractSerializer.ServiceStack/DataContractSerializer are designed for scenarios where you control the schema. Use XmlSerializer instead.
A few things:
Since you are using the [DataContract] attribute. You must include the DTOs properties with the [DataMember] Attribute or they will be skipped in the serialization/deserialization process. Use the assembly attribute as specified in XML deserializing only works with namespace in xml
Your xml manipulation needs to change to wrap the rss inside a response instead or replacing it.
xml = xml.Replace("<rss version=\"2.0\">", "<Response><rss version=\"2.0\">");
I would recommend building an test Response object yourself, serlialize it to XML using ServiceStack's .ToXml() method to see the format it is expecting. You will see service stack handles the channel items as a child list of items that is not how the RSS formats the channel items. You would have to wrap all your items into a node called <ItemClass>
I have a problem that I'm working in nHibernate project that have the following object:
[Serializable]
public class Prototype
{
public virtual long Id { get; private set; }
public virtual string Name { get; set; }
public virtual IList<AttributeGroup> AttributeGroups { get; private set; }
}
I have created a method to deserialize an XML file and put it into object of type Prototype as following :
public static T Deserialize(string fileName)
{
XmlSerializer xmlSerializer = new XmlSerializer(typeof(T));
XmlTextReader xmlTextReader = new XmlTextReader(fileName);
Object c = xmlSerializer.Deserialize(xmlTextReader);
return (T)c;
}
The problem now is that I have the following exception:
Unable to cast object of type 'NHibernate.Collection.Generic.PersistentGenericBag`1[BCatalog.Entities.AttributeGroup]' to type 'System.Collections.Generic.List`1[BCatalog.Entities.AttributeGroup]'.
I can't change the type of the IList because of the nHibernate and I want to deserialize the object.
What should I do to solve this problem ?
Interfaces seems to be cumbersome for serialization/deserialization processes. You might need to add another public member to the class that uses a concrete type and mark the interface property as xml ignore. This way you can deserialize the object without loosing your contract base.
Something like the following:
[Serializable]
public class Prototype
{
public virtual long Id { get; private set; }
public virtual string Name { get; set; }
[XMLIgnore]
public virtual IList<AttributeGroup> AttributeGroups {
get { return this.AttributeGroupsList; }
}
public virtual List<AttributeGroup> AttributeGroupsList { get; private set;}
}
For more information about deserialization attributes please check XmlAttributes Properties.
Regards,