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Converter that uses generics to parse json model

I have a converter class that receives json in input, here are 2 valid examples:
{
"method": "Model",
"payload": {
"key": "value"
}
}
and
{
"method": "OtherModel",
"payload": {
"foo": "bar"
}
}
In C#, I have classes mapped to each possible model:
public class Model
{
public string Key { get; set; }
}
public class OtherModel
{
public string Foo { get; set; }
}
I need a generic converter
How can I use the string value in the method of the JSON to convert in a generic way the content of the payload field?
Is using a huge switch the only way? This is the prototype I have so far but there are hundreds of different models so it will grow quite large...
public IResult ParseJson(string json)
{
Regex regexMessageName = new Regex("\"messageName\": \"(.*?)\"", RegexOptions.Compiled);
var messageName = regexMessageName.Match(json).Groups[1].Value;
switch (messageName)
{
case "Model":
var raw = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<JsonData<Model>>(json);
return new LogInfoRequestResult<Model> { Raw = raw };
case "OtherModel":
var raw = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<JsonData<OtherModel>>(json);
return new LogInfoRequestResult<OtherModel> { Raw = raw };
}
}

If you want complete control of your classes, and allow them to evolve independently, then you can have one base class that owns the Method, and then as many subclasses as you want with their own definition of the payload.
First, parse into the baseclass, just to get a strongly typed deserialization of Method
Then, there are a lot of patterns to address branching logic.
If you have 1-2 cases, an if statement is fine
If you have 3-5 cases, you can use a switch
If you have 6-10 cases, you can create a dictionary that maps method name to class type
If you have more than that, you can use the strategy pattern and pass an interface around
Here's an example of how you could write the code:
var json = #"{
'method': 'Model',
'payload': {
'key': 'value'
}
}";
var modelBase = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<ModelBase>(json);
var methodMapping = new Dictionary<string, Type>()
{
{MethodTypes.Model.ToString(), typeof(Model)},
{MethodTypes.OtherModel.ToString(), typeof(OtherModel)},
};
Type methodClass = methodMapping[modelBase.Method];
var result = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject(json, methodClass);
Note: Since we're programmatically determining the correct type, it's hard to pass to a generic <T>, so this uses the overload of DeserializeObject that takes type as a param
And here are the classes that model incoming messages
public enum MethodTypes
{
Model,
OtherModel
}
public class ModelBase
{
public string Method { get; set; }
}
public class Model : ModelBase
{
public ModelInfo Payload { get; set; }
public class ModelInfo
{
public string Key { get; set; }
}
}
public class OtherModel : ModelBase
{
public ModelInfo Payload { get; set; }
public class ModelInfo
{
public string Foo { get; set; }
}
}
Dictionary<string,string>
If your data is always going to be "foo":"bar" or "key":"value" .... string:string, then Cid's suggesting to use Dictionary<string,string> Payload makes a lot of sense. Then figure out however you want to map from that c# class in a c# constructor that returns whatever type you want.
Additional Resources:
How to handle both a single item and an array for the same property using JSON.net
Deserializing polymorphic json classes without type information using json.net
JSON.NET - Conditional Type Deserialization
Conditionally deserialize JSON string or array property to C# object using JSON.NET?

You can instanciate an object of the expected class using Activator.CreateInstance(), then populate it with JsonConvert.PopulateObject()
In example :
Type t = Type.GetType($"NameSpaceName.{messageName}"); // this must be a fully qualified name
object obj = Activator.CreateInstance(t);
JsonConvert.PopulateObject(json, obj);

How to make business objects serialization ignorance?

I have the following business object
public class Employee
{
[JsonProperty("first_name")]
public string FirstName { get; set; }
public string Lastname { get; set; }
public DateTime DateOfBirth { get; set; }
public uint Salary { get; set; }
}
And i have the following interface and implementation for json serialization
interface IJSONSerializer<T>
{
string Serialize(T obj);
}
class NewtonJsonSerialization<T> : IJSONSerializer<T>
{
public string Serialize(T obj)
{
return JsonConvert.SerializeObject(obj, Formatting.Indented);
}
}
And here is my client code
var Employee = new Employee();
Employee.FirstName = "Ihor";
Employee.Lastname = "fff";
IJSONSerializer<Employee> serailizer = new NewtonJsonSerialization<Employee>();
var result = serailizer.Serialize(Employee);
What i dislike here - that Employee knows that it will be serialized with some specific library(because of JsonProperty attribute). So, if i decide to use another json serializer or write my own, i will need to go through all business objects and modify them. Is it possible to make my business objects serialization ignorance ? If yes how ?
The same with XML serialization and XmlSerializer class: i need to mark properties in business object with some attribute.
There is a term "persistence ignorance" which means that business objects are not aware of persistence. Is there the same about serialization ?

Most serializers make use of .Net's DataContract attributes. Json.net does as well. Try this sample out and make sure to look up the documentation for DataMember on MSDN to learn how to influence serialization.

Unless you need serialized key/element names to different than defined on your C# class, you should not worry about attributes at all. Both JSON and XML work just fine without decorating you class properties with serialization specific attributes.
If you really need custom key/element names in serialized data, then you must decorate your class props with multiple attributes. Any serializer will just read relevant attribute and ignore rest.
public class Person
{
[JsonProperty("first_name")]
[XmlElement("first_name")]
public string FirstName { get; set; }
}
Calling Code
ISerializer<Person> serializer;
string result;
var person = new Person { FirstName = "Nikhil" };
serializer = new NewtonsoftJsonSerializer<Person>();
result = serializer.Serialize(person);
/* Output
{"first_name":"Nikhil"}
*/
serializer = new BuiltInXmlSerializer<Person>();
result = serializer.Serialize(person);
/* Output
<Person
xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema">
<first_name>Nikhil</first_name>
</Person>
*/
Edit:
As per #Michael Nero DataContract and DataMember attributes will work in most cases but not all. Very first exception on such list is .NET's built in XmlSerializer which does not work without XmlElement attribute for custom element name.

JSON.NET (WebApi2) - Serialize property, but skip during deserialization

I know of [JsonIgnore] which ignores properties altogether, I know of ShouldSerializePropertyName which gives conditional serialization, but I cannot find anything to mark property to be serialized into JSON normally, but not set during deserialization.
I could write a workaround:
[JsonIgnore]
public string MyValue{get;set;}
public string MyValueForJson {get{return MyValue;}
but it is a last resort. Is there some way - other than custom converters etc. - to express that I don't want that field to be populated during deserialization?

As I understand you want to serialize object with all properties in json string but retrieve only selected properties while deserialization on that string.
If this is case then, I had a similar requirement where I created BaseType and DerivedType classes then I serialize derived type into Json string while deserialization I want it in Base type instance. So wrote this code :
using System.Web.Script.Serialization;
public static TB CastToBase<T, TB>(this T derivedTypeInstance)
{
var serializer = new JavaScriptSerializer();
var baseTypeInstance = serializer.Deserialize<TB>(serializer.Serialize(derivedTypeInstance));
return baseTypeInstance;
}

I think you can put [JsonObject(MemberSerialization.OptIn)] property on the class, which requires to explicitly state which properties to serialize. Then you can use both [JsonProperty] and [JsonIgnore] on a property you'd like to serialize as normal but ignore on deserialization.
Example:
[JsonObject(MemberSerialization.OptIn)]
private class UserData
{
[JsonProperty]
public string Token { get; set; }
[JsonProperty]
public string Username { get; set; }
[JsonIgnore]
[JsonProperty]
public string Password { get; set; }
}

Using Web API to deserialize into class with abstract property

I'm attempting to write a set of classes to represent a particularly complex object, and in one of those classes, I have a property that is set as the base (abstract) class of three possible derived classes. I'm setting up an ASP.NET Web API to handle the serialization and deserialization, which means that, by default, it uses Json.NET for JSON. How can I get the Web API to properly deserialize JSON sent via POST or PUT into the proper derived class?
The class with the abstract member looks like this (I'm including the Xml decorators for clarity and because they work perfectly well for deserializing xml using the XmlSerializer)
[Serializable]
public class FormulaStructure {
[XmlElement("column", typeof(ColumnStructure))]
[XmlElement("function", typeof(FunctionStructure))]
[XmlElement("operand", typeof(OperandStructure))]
public AFormulaItemStructure FormulaItem;
}
The abstract class is pretty basic:
[Serializable]
public abstract class AFormulaItemStructure { }
And there are three derivatives of the abstract class:
[Serializable]
public class ColumnStructure: AFormulaItemStructure {
[XmlAttribute("type")]
public string Type;
[XmlAttribute("field")]
public string Field;
[XmlAttribute("display")]
public string Display;
}
[Serializable]
public class FunctionStructure: AFormulaItemStructure {
[XmlAttribute("type")]
public string Type;
[XmlAttribute("name")]
public string Name;
[XmlElement("parameters")]
public string Parameters;
}
[Serializable]
public class OperandStructure: AFormulaItemStructure {
[XmlAttribute("type")]
public string Type;
[XmlElement("left")]
public string Left;
[XmlElement("right")]
public string Right;
}
At present, using [DataContract] attributes, the Json.NET formatter fails to populate the derived class, leaving the property null.
Questions
Can I mix XmlSerializer attributes with DataContractSerializer attributes on the same class? I use the XmlSerializer because I use xml attributes in the xml I designed, but that can be changed if necessary since I am developing the xml schema myself.
What is the equivalent in Json.NET to [KnownType()] ? Json.NET doesn't appear to respect the DataContractSerializer version of KnownType. Will I need to roll my own JsonConverter to determine the proper type?
How would I decorate the classes so that DataContractSerializer or DataContractJsonSerializer will properly deserialize the objects in both Xml and Json? My goal is to put this into an ASP.NET Web API, so I want the flexibility to generate Xml or Json, as appropriate to the requested type. Is there an alternative formatter that I need to use to work with this complex class, if Json.NET won't work?
I need the ability to generate an object on the client side without necessarily including the .NET class names into the object.
Testing and Refinement
In my testing of the Web API, the default serialization sends down to the client:
{"FormulaItem":{"type":"int","field":"my_field","display":"My Field"}}
which is ideal for my purposes. Getting this to go back to the API and deserialize into the proper derived types, though, isn't working (it's generating null for the property).
Testing Tommy Grovnes answer below, the DataContractSerializer he used for testing generates:
{"FormulaItem":{"__type":"column:#ExpressionStructureExperimentation.Models","display":"My Field","field":"my_field","type":"int"}}
which doesn't work for me, or for code maintainability (refactoring becomes a PITA if I hard-code the entire namespace into the JavaScript for generating these objects).

You can mix as mentioned already but I don't think you need to, haven't used WEB api myself but WCF Rest produces xml and json from DataContracts (without Xml.. tags), tag your classes like this:
[DataContract]
public class FormulaStructure
{
[DataMember]
public AFormulaItemStructure FormulaItem;
}
[DataContract]
[KnownType(typeof(ColumnStructure))]
[KnownType(typeof(FunctionStructure))]
[KnownType(typeof(OperandStructure))]
public abstract class AFormulaItemStructure { }
[DataContract(Name="column")]
public class ColumnStructure : AFormulaItemStructure
{
[DataMember(Name="type")]
public string Type;
[DataMember(Name = "field")]
public string Field;
[DataMember(Name = "display")]
public string Display;
}
[DataContract(Name="function")]
public class FunctionStructure : AFormulaItemStructure
{
[DataMember(Name = "type")]
public string Type;
[DataMember(Name = "name")]
public string Name;
[DataMember(Name = "parameters")]
public string Parameters;
}
[DataContract(Name = "operand")]
public class OperandStructure : AFormulaItemStructure
{
[DataMember(Name = "type")]
public string Type;
[DataMember(Name = "left")]
public string Left;
[DataMember(Name = "right")]
public string Right;
}
If you need more control over the XML/JSON generated you might have to tweak this further. I used this code to test:
public static string Serialize(FormulaStructure structure)
{
using (MemoryStream memoryStream = new MemoryStream())
using (StreamReader reader = new StreamReader(memoryStream))
{
var serializer = new DataContractSerializer(typeof(FormulaStructure));
serializer.WriteObject(memoryStream, structure);
memoryStream.Position = 0;
return reader.ReadToEnd();
}
}
public static FormulaStructure Deserialize(string xml)
{
using (Stream stream = new MemoryStream())
{
byte[] data = System.Text.Encoding.UTF8.GetBytes(xml);
stream.Write(data, 0, data.Length);
stream.Position = 0;
var deserializer = new DataContractSerializer(typeof(FormulaStructure));
return (FormulaStructure)deserializer.ReadObject(stream);
}
}

After we ran into some issues much further down the line with my previous answer, I discovered the SerializationBinder class that JSON can use for serializing/deserializing namespaces.
Code First
I generated a class to inherit the SerializationBinder:
public class KnownTypesBinder : System.Runtime.Serialization.SerializationBinder {
public KnownTypesBinder() {
KnownTypes = new List<Type>();
AliasedTypes = new Dictionary<string, Type>();
}
public IList<Type> KnownTypes { get; set; }
public IDictionary<string, Type> AliasedTypes { get; set; }
public override Type BindToType(string assemblyName, string typeName) {
if (AliasedTypes.ContainsKey(typeName)) { return AliasedTypes[typeName]; }
var type = KnownTypes.SingleOrDefault(t => t.Name == typeName);
if (type == null) {
type = Type.GetType(Assembly.CreateQualifiedName(assemblyName, typeName));
if (type == null) {
throw new InvalidCastException("Unknown type encountered while deserializing JSON. This can happen if class names have changed but the database or the JavaScript references the old class name.");
}
}
return type;
}
public override void BindToName(Type serializedType, out string assemblyName, out string typeName) {
assemblyName = null;
typeName = serializedType.Name;
}
}
How it works
Let's say I have a set of classes defined thus:
public class Class1 {
public string Text { get; set; }
}
public class Class2 {
public int Value { get; set; }
}
public class MyClass {
public Class1 Text { get; set; }
public Class2 Value { get; set; }
}
Aliased Types
What this does is allows me to generate my own names for classes that will be serialized/deserialized. In my global.asax file, I apply the binder as such:
KnownTypesBinder binder = new KnownTypesBinder()
binder.AliasedTypes["Class1"] = typeof(Project1.Class1);
binder.AliasedTypes["WhateverStringIWant"] = typeof(Project1.Class2);
var json = GlobalConfiguration.Configuration.Formatters.JsonFormatter;
json.SerializerSettings.Binder = binder;
Now, whenever I serialize, say, MyClass as JSON, I get the following:
{
item: {
$type: "Project1.MyClass",
Text: {
$type: "Class1",
Text: "some value"
},
Value: {
$type: "WhateverStringIWant",
Value: 88
}
}
}
Known Types
I can also choose to strip off the assembly information and strictly use the class name by adding information to the KnownTypesBinder:
KnownTypesBinder binder = new KnownTypesBinder()
binder.KnownTypes.Add(typeof(Project1.Class1));
binder.KnownTypes.Add(typeof(Project1.Class1));
In the two examples given, Class1 is referenced the same way. However, if I refactor Class1 to, say, NewClass1, then this second example will start sending a different name. That may or may not be a big deal, depending on whether you are using the types or not.
Final Thoughts
The advantage of the AliasedTypes is that I can give it any string that I want, and it doesn't matter how much I refactor the code, the communication between the .NET and the JavaScript (or whatever consumer is out there) is unbroken.
Be careful not to mix AliasedTypes and KnownTypes that have the exact same class name, because the code is written that the AliasType will win out over KnownType. When the binder doesn't recognize a type (aliased or known), it will provide the full assembly name of the type.

In the end, I broke down and added the .NET class information to the module in string variables to make refactoring easier.
module.net = {};
module.net.classes = {};
module.net.classes['column'] = "ColumnStructure";
module.net.classes['function'] = "FunctionStructure";
module.net.classes['operand'] = "OperandStructure";
module.net.getAssembly = function (className) {
return "MyNamespace.Models." + module.net.classes[className] + ", MyAssembly";
}
and generated the JSON as
{
"FormulaItem": {
"$type": module.net.getAssembly('column'),
"type": "int",
"field": "my_field",
"display": "My Field"
}
}

Json.net serialize/deserialize derived types?

json.net (newtonsoft)
I am looking through the documentation but I can't find anything on this or the best way to do it.
public class Base
{
public string Name;
}
public class Derived : Base
{
public string Something;
}
JsonConvert.Deserialize<List<Base>>(text);
Now I have Derived objects in the serialized list. How do I deserialize the list and get back derived types?

You have to enable Type Name Handling and pass that to the (de)serializer as a settings parameter.
Base object1 = new Base() { Name = "Object1" };
Derived object2 = new Derived() { Something = "Some other thing" };
List<Base> inheritanceList = new List<Base>() { object1, object2 };
JsonSerializerSettings settings = new JsonSerializerSettings { TypeNameHandling = TypeNameHandling.All };
string Serialized = JsonConvert.SerializeObject(inheritanceList, settings);
List<Base> deserializedList = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<List<Base>>(Serialized, settings);
This will result in correct deserialization of derived classes. A drawback to it is that it will name all the objects you are using, as such it will name the list you are putting the objects in.

If you are storing the type in your text (as you should be in this scenario), you can use the JsonSerializerSettings.
See: how to deserialize JSON into IEnumerable<BaseType> with Newtonsoft JSON.NET
Be careful, though. Using anything other than TypeNameHandling = TypeNameHandling.None could open yourself up to a security vulnerability.

Since the question is so popular, it may be useful to add on what to do if you want to control the type property name and its value.
The long way is to write custom JsonConverters to handle (de)serialization by manually checking and setting the type property.
A simpler way is to use JsonSubTypes, which handles all the boilerplate via attributes:
[JsonConverter(typeof(JsonSubtypes), "Sound")]
[JsonSubtypes.KnownSubType(typeof(Dog), "Bark")]
[JsonSubtypes.KnownSubType(typeof(Cat), "Meow")]
public class Animal
{
public virtual string Sound { get; }
public string Color { get; set; }
}
public class Dog : Animal
{
public override string Sound { get; } = "Bark";
public string Breed { get; set; }
}
public class Cat : Animal
{
public override string Sound { get; } = "Meow";
public bool Declawed { get; set; }
}

Use this JsonKnownTypes, it's very similar way to use, it just add discriminator to json:
[JsonConverter(typeof(JsonKnownTypeConverter<BaseClass>))]
[JsonKnownType(typeof(Base), "base")]
[JsonKnownType(typeof(Derived), "derived")]
public class Base
{
public string Name;
}
public class Derived : Base
{
public string Something;
}
Now when you serialize object in json will be add "$type" with "base" and "derived" value and it will be use for deserialize
Serialized list example:
[
{"Name":"some name", "$type":"base"},
{"Name":"some name", "Something":"something", "$type":"derived"}
]

just add object in Serialize method
var jsonMessageBody = JsonSerializer.Serialize<object>(model);