C# and .NET: How to serialize a structure into a byte[] array, using BinaryWriter?

Question

How to serialize a rather complex structure into a byte[] array, using BinaryWriter?

Update:

• For this to work, every structure (and sub-structure?) must be decorated with the [Serializable] attribute.

• I do not need to implement the ISerializable interface, as this is designed to give an object control over its own serialization.

Answer 1

Use the BinaryFormatter to serialize an object to a byte[]. BinaryWriter is just for writing bytes to a stream.

MyObject obj = new MyObject();
byte[] bytes;
IFormatter formatter = new BinaryFormatter();
using (MemoryStream stream = new MemoryStream())
{
   formatter.Serialize(stream, obj);
   bytes = stream.ToArray();
}

Answer 2

From comments, the OP's scenario requires strong compatibility with future versions of the application / .NET, in which case I always advise againt BinaryFormatter - it has many "features" that simply don't work well between versions (and certainly not between platforms).

I recommend looking at contract-based serializers; I'm biased, but I lean towards protobuf-net (which maps to Google's protobuf specification). The easiest way to do this is to attribute the types in such a way that the library can make light work of them (although it can also be done without attributes), for example:

 [ProtoContract]
 public class Customer {
     [ProtoMember(1)]
     public List<Order> Orders {get {....}}

     [ProtoMember(2)]
     public string Name {get;set;}

     ... etc
 }

(the attribute appoach is very familiar if you've done any XmlSerializer or DataContractSerializer work - and indeed protobuf-net can consume the attributes from those if you don't want to add protobuf-net specific attributes)

then something like:

Customer cust = ...
byte[] data;
using(var ms = new MemoryStream()) {
    Serializer.Serialize(ms, cust);
    data = ms.ToArray();
}

The data produced this way is platform independent, and could be loaded on any matching contract (it doesn't even need to be Customer - it could any type with matching layout via the attributes). Indeed, in most cases it'll load easily into any other protobuf implementation - Java, C++, etc.

Answer 3

code snippet.

public static byte[] XmlSerializeToByte<T>(T value) where T : class
{
    if (value == null)
    {
        throw new ArgumentNullException();
    }

    XmlSerializer serializer = new XmlSerializer(typeof(T));

    using (MemoryStream memoryStream = new MemoryStream())
    {
        using (XmlWriter xmlWriter = XmlWriter.Create(memoryStream))
        {
            serializer.Serialize(xmlWriter, value);

            return memoryStream.ToArray();
        }
    }
}

    public static T XmlDeserializeFromBytes<T> (byte[] bytes)
                                     where T : class
    {
        if (bytes == null || bytes.Length == 0)
        {
            throw new InvalidOperationException();
        }

        XmlSerializer serializer = new XmlSerializer(typeof(T));

        using (MemoryStream memoryStream = new MemoryStream(bytes))
        {
            using (XmlReader xmlReader = XmlReader.Create(memoryStream))
            {
                return (T)serializer.Deserialize(xmlReader);
            }
        }
    }


        //Serialize
        Duck duck = new Duck() { Name = "Donald Duck" };
        byte[] bytes = Test.XmlSerializeToByte(duck);
        //Deserialize
        var deDuck = Test.XmlDeserializeFromBytes<Duck>(bytes);
        Console.WriteLine(deDuck.Name);