Generating XML document with C# - c#

I need to generate an XML document that follows this specifictaion
<productName locale="en_GB">Name</productName>
but using XMLSeralization I am getting the following
<productName locale="en_GB">
<Name>Name</Name>
</productName>
My C# code is like this:
[Serializable]
public class productName
{
public productName()
{
}
public string Name;
[XmlAttribute]
public string locale;
}
XmlAttribute is what is required to show the locale in the correct place, but I am unable to figure out how to export the Name field correctly.
Does anyone have an idea?
Thanks
EDIT:
This is the code to generate the XML
public static class XMLSerialize
{
public static void SerializeToXml<T>(string file, T value)
{
var serializer = new XmlSerializer(typeof(T));
using (var writer = XmlWriter.Create(file))
serializer.Serialize(writer, value);
}
public static T DeserializeFromXML<T>(string file)
{
XmlSerializer deserializer = new XmlSerializer(typeof(T));
TextReader textReader = new StreamReader(file);
T result;
result = (T)deserializer.Deserialize(textReader);
textReader.Close();
return result;
}
}

Instead of specifying Name as element specify it as text value by adding [XmlText] attribute
[XmlText]
public string Value { get; set; }

This contains not only a direct answer to your question, but more of a indirect answer of how to solve similar issues like this in the future.
Start the other way around, with your xml, write your xml exactly like you want it and go from there, like this:
// assuming data.xml contains the xml as you'd like it
> xsd.exe data.xml // will generate data.xsd, ie xsd-descriptor
> xsd.exe data.xsd /classes // will generate data.cs, ie c# classes
> notepad.exe data.cs // have a look at data.cs with your favorite editor
Now just have a look at data.cs, this will contain an enormous amount of attributes and stuff and the namespaces are probably wrong, but at least you know how to solve your particular xml-issue.
The direct answer is to use the XmlTextAttribute on the given property, preferably named Value since that is the convention I've seen so far.
[Serializable]
public class productName {
public productName() { }
[XmlText]
public string Value {get; set;}
[XmlAttribute]
public string locale {get; set;}
}

Related

How can I put unescaped XML into the XmlText field for a class?

I have a class where I want to put XML (HTML, actually) that is unescaped. It does not conform to a specification since it can be arbitrary html. How can I achieve that declaratively?
Ex:
public class Material
{
[XmlElement(ElementName = "mattext")]
public string MaterialText { get; set; }
public bool ShouldSerializeMaterialText()
{
return !string.IsNullOrEmpty(MaterialText);
}
}
If you put: <p>test</p> into MaterialText, it produces <p>test</p> in it's serialized output. How can I modify this to produce the string literal AS XML instead of an escaped sequence?
To be clear, the output I'm looking for is: <mattext><p>test</p></mattext>
Btw - This isn't my first choice, but it is someone else's schema that must, unfortunately, be adhered to.
Thanks!
If you cannot use a CDATA section, you have to use the following workaround:
public class Material
{
[XmlIgnore]
public string MaterialText { get; set; }
[XmlElement(ElementName = "mattext")]
public XmlElement MatText
{
get {
var doc = new XmlDocument();
doc.LoadXml(MaterialText);
return doc.DocumentElement;
}
set { /* implement in a similar way */ }
}
(you could of course add some kind of caching for the getter)

How to use ISeriealizeable attribute to serialize only relevant fields?

I have a class called MyBoard that looks like this
Public MyBoard
{
private BoardTile[,] tiles;
private bool tilesEliminated;
public int blabla {get; set; }
}
If i understand correctly the Serializable attribute serializes the entire class, what I'm attempting to do is to have the ability to serialize only the fields i want into XML format (other fields are irrelevant)
In my case i would like to write something that looks like this :
[ISerializable]
Public MyBoard
{
[SerializeMe]
private BoardTile[,] tiles;
private bool tilesEliminated;
public int blabla {get; set; }
}
I want to choose with some attribute what to serialize and what not, more over inside the class "BoardTile" i would like to do the same thing and choose the relevant fields also.
And then write something like this
main()
{
MyBoard m = new MyBoard();
//fill the tiles somehow.
m.SerializeToXml();
}
If i understand correctly i need to write a custom serializer by myself by inheriting ISerializable, but maybe it's possible to avoid it and letting .Net to serialize by himself automatically with some attributes that i don't know about.
By the way it's important to me that the output will be XML so i could read it.
I hope you understand my question, thanks for you help :)
Use DataContract attribute and XmlSerializer class:
[DataContract]
Public MyBoard
{
[DataMember]
pricate BoardTile[,] tiles;
private bool tilesEliminated;
public int blabla {get; set; }
}
And serialization:
var board = new MyBoard();
var ser = new DataContractSerializer(typeof(MyBoard));
var sw = new StringWriter();
ser.WriteObject(sw, board);
sw.Close();
var xml = sw.ToString();
It will serialize only members that are marked with [DataMember] attribute and skip the other ones.

how to serialize class objects to xml document

I hope to find a solution from you. What I need is to serialize ValidatorList class object into an xml document. How to do this?
I tried like this:
XmlSerializer _serializer = new XmlSerializer(list);
But I don't know how to make output of xml for list that has several classes.
C#
_list= new ListVal();
Type _type = typeof(ras);
_list.Add(new RequiredField
{
Property = _type.GetProperty("CustRef")
}.Add(new AsciiVal()));
_list.Add(new RequiredField
{
Property = _type.GetProperty("ctr")
}.Add(new StringLengthVal
{
min= 3,
max= 3
}));
[Serializable]
public class Field
{
public Field Next
{
get;
set;
}
public Field TypeName
{
get;
set;
}
public Field PropertyName
{
get;
set;
}
}
public class RequiredField : Field
{
//TODO
}
public class AsciiVal: Field
{
//TODO
}
public class StringLengthVal: Field
{
//TODO
}
public class ListVal: List<Field>
{
//TODO
}
I have something close, but not exactly the Xml you want. In actual fact I think you'll see that the Xml produced below makes a bit more sense than what you have.
To get you started, you control the serialization and deserialization using attributes in the System.Xml.Serialization namespace. A few useful ones to read up on are
XmlRootAttribute
XmlElementAttribute
XmlAttributeAttribute
XmlIncludeAttribute
So I mocked up some code which closely matches your own. Notice the addition of some attributes to instruct the serializer how I want the Xml to be laid out.
[XmlInclude(typeof(AsciiValidator))]
[XmlInclude(typeof(RequiredValidator))]
[XmlInclude(typeof(StringLengthValidator))]
public class FieldValidator
{
[XmlElement("Next")]
public FieldValidator Next
{
get;
set;
}
[XmlElement("PropertyName")]
public string PropertyName
{
get;
set;
}
}
public class AsciiValidator: FieldValidator
{
}
public class RequiredValidator: FieldValidator
{
}
public class StringLengthValidator: FieldValidator
{
[XmlElement]
public int MinLength{get;set;}
[XmlElement]
public int MaxLength{get;set;}
}
[XmlRoot("ValidatorList")]
public class ValidatorList : List<FieldValidator>
{
}
Point of interest; Every class inheriting FieldValidator must be added to the list of known types using XmlIncludeAttribute so the serializer knows what to do with them)
Then I created an example object map:
var test = new ValidatorList();
test.Add(
new RequiredValidator()
{
PropertyName="CustRef",
Next = new AsciiValidator()
});
test.Add(
new RequiredValidator()
{
PropertyName="CurrencyIndicator",
Next = new StringLengthValidator(){
MinLength=3,
MaxLength = 10
}
});
Finally I told the serializer to serialize it (and output the result to the console)
var ser = new XmlSerializer(typeof(ValidatorList));
ser.Serialize(Console.Out,test);
This was the result:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<ValidatorList xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema">
<FieldValidator xsi:type="RequiredValidator">
<Next xsi:type="AsciiValidator" />
<PropertyName>CustRef</PropertyName>
</FieldValidator>
<FieldValidator xsi:type="RequiredValidator">
<Next xsi:type="StringLengthValidator">
<MinLength>3</MinLength>
<MaxLength>10</MaxLength>
</Next>
<PropertyName>CurrencyIndicator</PropertyName>
</FieldValidator>
</ValidatorList>
Not a million miles away from what you wanted. There is the need to output certain things in a certain way (eg xsi:type tells the serializer how to deserialize back to the object map). I hope this gives you a good start.
Here is a live, working example: http://rextester.com/OXPOB95358
Deserialization can be done by calling the Deserialize method on the XmlSerializer.
For example, if your xml is in a string:
var ser = new XmlSerializer(typeof(ValidatorList));
var test = "<..../>" // Your Xml
var xmlReader = XmlReader.Create(new StringReader(test));
var validatorList = (ValidatorList)ser.Deserialize(xmlReader);
There are many overrides of Deserialize which take differing inputs depending if the data is in a Stream an existing reader, or saved to a file.
You have to decorate the class that contains the _validators field with the KonwnType attribute
[Serializable]
[KwownType(typeof(RequiredFieldValidator)]
[KwownType(typeof(AsciValidator)]
public class MySerialisableClass
I have several SO answers that detail how to serialize objects using XML. I'll provide links below.
However, since you're looking for a rather simple serialization of your object, you may want to read up on the DataContractSerializer. It's much less complicated than the old .NET 1.x XML Serialization.
Here's the list of SO answers:
Omitting all xsi and xsd namespaces when serializing an object in .NET?
XmlSerializer: remove unnecessary xsi and xsd namespaces
Suppress xsi:nil but still show Empty Element when Serializing in .Net
Using XmlAttributeOverrides on Nested Properties
Even though many of these have to do with XML serialization and namespaces, they contain complete examples of serializing an object to XML using .NET 1.x XML Serialization.

XmlSerializer output xml types

I am using the XmlSerializer, and was wondering if there is any way, using overrides or something to that effect to get the XmlSerializer to output the types of some nodes.
My problem is that I have serialized a byte array.
class MyClass {
public string Name { get; set; }
public byte[] Bytes { get; set; }
}
I am consuming the xml in a generic service.
The service collects the xml as .
<MyClass>
<Name>Test</Name>
<Bytes>U2NhcnkgQnVnZ2Vy</Bytes>
</MyClass>
Is there any way to either generate an xsd at runtime, or somehow output something like this.
I cannot change the class I am serializing, but I can apply overrides to the serializer or in some other way control the serialization.
<Bytes xsi:type='BinaryOfSomeKind'>BlahBlah</Bytes>
I need to know that the data is binary somehow.
Thanks
Craig.
If your class is supplied by a third party then you know your properties and property types and you can deduce your XML and XSD from it. You can create your XSD manually or with the help of a XML tool for example XMLSpy (not free BTW) or XMLFox which is free of charge.
If you know the xml is going to be in that format that you put in the question and you have your class ready you can decorate it as such for it to be deserialized.
The Deserialization class:
[XmlTypeAttribute]
[XmlRootAttribute("MyClass")]
public class MyClass
{
[XmlElementAttribute("Name")]
public string Name { get; set; }
[XmlElementAttribute("Bytes")]
public byte[] Bytes { get; set; }
}
The Deserialzation Method
public static object Deserialize(string xml)
{
var deserializer = new System.Xml.Serialization.XmlSerializer(typeof(MyClass));
using (var reader = XmlReader.Create(new StringReader(xml)))
{
return (MyClass)deserializer.Deserialize(reader);
}
}
The Main Method
static void Main(string[] args)
{
string xml = #"<MyClass>
<Name>Test</Name>
<Bytes>U2NhcnkgQnVnZ2Vy</Bytes>
</MyClass>";
MyClass obj = (MyClass)Deserialize(xml);
Console.ReadKey();
}
Make sure to add the following using statements:
using System.Xml.Serialization;
using System.Xml;
It deserialized it into an obj with "Test" as the byte array.
If you generate the XSD at run time, then theres no way you can know what properties there are and it would be down to using reflection to test for specific properties, and then subsequently finding out what types they may be, is this what your after?

Deserialize xml which uses attribute name/value pairs

My application receives a constant stream of xml files which are more or less a direct copy of the database record
<record type="update">
<field name="id">987654321</field>
<field name="user_id">4321</field>
<field name="updated">2011-11-24 13:43:23</field>
</record>
And I need to deserialize this into a class which provides nullable property's for all columns
class Record {
public long? Id { get; set; }
public long? UserId { get; set; }
public DateTime? Updated { get; set; }
}
I just cant seem to work out a method of doing this without having to parse the xml file manually and switch on the field's name attribute to store the values.
Is their a way this can be achieved quickly using an XmlSerializer? And if not is their a more efficient way of parsing it manually?
Regards and thanks
My main problem is that the attribute name needs to have its value set to a property name and its value as the contents of a <field>..</field> element
Edit
Edited the answer to reflect the best you can get with your current xml layout you will get an array of field objects with two properties, Name, eg ID, and Value, the text in the node
You can create an Xml Definition class, pass this to an Xml Serializer and it will return you the object with the values of your xml intialised into it's properties.
So given the following definition file.
[XmlTypeAttribute]
[XmlRootAttribute("record")]
public class RecordXmlConfiguration
{
[XmlElementAttribute("field")]
public Field[] Fields { get; set; }
}
[XmlTypeAttribute]
public class Field
{
[XmlAttributeAttribute("name")]
public string Name { get; set; }
[XmlText]
public string Value { get; set; }
}
Then when you have your xml you pass it to a method and it should return you an object of the type of your Xml defintiion class as so
public static object Deserialize(string xml)
{
var deserializer = new System.Xml.Serialization.XmlSerializer(typeof(RecordXmlConfiguration));
using (var reader = XmlReader.Create(new StringReader(xml)))
{
return (RecordXmlConfiguration)deserializer.Deserialize(reader);
}
}
It can be fiddly, but when its set up right it's saved me tonnes of time, as when your done with it you can also create a serialize method in the same maanner to return it to it's Xml form.
make sure to add references to your project to allow for these using statements
using System.Xml.Serialization;
using System.Xml;

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