Saving Data Structures in C#

Question

I'm learning C# by writing a home library manager.

I have a BookController that will store the books in a data structure and perform operations on them.

Does C# have a way of saving the data in the dictionary to a local file perhaps in an XML fashion to load later, or am I going to have to write it myself?

What is the best method of saving and loading this data available to C#? Just need pointed in a good direction.

score 24 · Accepted Answer · edited Dec 20 '16 at 04:45

Actually, C# (the language) doesn't know anything about serialization, but .NET (the framework) provides lots of ways... XmlSerializer, BinaryFormatter, DataContractSerializer (.NET 3.0) - or there are a few bespoke serialization frameworks too.

Which to use depends on your requirements; BinaryFormatter is simple to use, but burns assembly metadata information into the file - making it non-portable (you couldn't open it in Java, for example). XmlSerializer and DataContractSerializer are primarily xml-based, making it quite portable, but fairly large unless you compress it.

Some proprietary serializers are half-way between the two; protobuf-net is a binary formatter (so very dense data), but which follows a portable standard for the data format (Google's protocol buffers spec). Whether this is useful depends on your scenario.

Typical code (here using XmlSerializer):

        XmlSerializer ser = new XmlSerializer(typeof(Foo));
        // write
        using (var stream = File.Create("foo.xml"))
        {
            ser.Serialize(stream, foo); // your instance
        }
        // read
        using (var stream = File.OpenRead("foo.xml"))
        {
            Foo newFoo = (Foo)ser.Deserialize(stream);
        }

score 6 · Answer 2 · answered Dec 16 '08 at 07:12

6

Look at Serialization and the ISerializable interface

It allows you to save an object's state in a portable form.

answered Dec 16 '08 at 07:12

Ed S.

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Cameron MacFarland · Answer 3 · 2008-12-16T09:57:30.887

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If you want your data to be in XML format there's XmlSerializer.

EDIT: For some reason I was downvoted for suggesting this because XmlSerializer cannot serialize a Dictionary.

To get around this problem you can always customize the serialization process like this

edited Dec 16 '08 at 09:57

answered Dec 16 '08 at 07:41

Cameron MacFarland

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XmlSerializer is not able to serialize Dictionary. – Dario Solera Dec 16 '08 at 07:46
Who said this is what @Coyote is using? No need to down-vote, the answer is not *wrong*. Incomplete maybe, but then a hint alone suffices. There are ways to XML serialize a dictionary, if you hit that wall. – Tomalak Dec 16 '08 at 07:53
I see a dictionary as an internal look up optimization that doesn't need to be exposed in the data. i.e. if you dictionary key is a property in your object, then you are just bloating the payload by having it there twice and having the extra wrapper code. IMO it is lazy drag-drop coder practice to serialize dictionaries. – Lee Campbell Apr 12 '13 at 14:07

score 1 · Answer 4 · answered Dec 16 '08 at 08:28

1

You should also consider looking at Linq to SQL (or Entity Framework) for O/R mapping and storing your data into a database (SQL CE, SQL Express).

answered Dec 16 '08 at 08:28

gius

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score 1 · Answer 5 · edited May 23 '17 at 12:33

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I've created an extension method which takes an object and creates an xml string for you, all you need to do is save/load from file. XmlSerialisation

edited May 23 '17 at 12:33

Community

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answered Dec 16 '08 at 08:35

TWith2Sugars

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Saving Data Structures in C#

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