CODEWITHSUNDEEP
c#xmldeserialization
Erwin Okken
Erwin Okken

Reputation: 243

C# XML Deserialization with indented nested tags

I know there are several questions on Stackoverflow already regarding this subject, but I still couldn't find any answer about repeating tags. If I have such a XML structure:

<root>
    <block>
        <PositionX>100</PositionX>
        <PositionY>100</PositionY>
        <block>
            <PositionX>10</PositionX>
            <PositionY>15</PositionY>
            <button>
            </button>
        </block>
        <button>
        </button>
    </block>
</root>

The above structure can have buttons within blocks and blocks within blocks. This is the code that I use at the moment, which doesn't allow nested items:

The Deserialization:

    public static GUI Deserialize(string filename)
    {
        GUI gui = null;
        XmlSerializer serializer = new XmlSerializer(typeof(GUI));
        StreamReader reader = new StreamReader(filename);
        gui = (GUI)serializer.Deserialize(reader);
        reader.Close();
        return gui;
    }

The root class:

[Serializable()]
[XmlRoot("View")]
public class GUI
{
    [XmlArray("Blocks")]
    [XmlArrayItem("Block", typeof(GUIBlock))]
    public GUIBlock[] Blocks { get; set; }
}

The block:

[Serializable()]
public class GUIBlock
{
    [XmlElement("Name")]
    public string Name { get; set; }

    [XmlElement("Position")]
    [XmlAttribute("X")]
    public int PositionX { get; set; }

    [XmlElement("Position")]
    [XmlAttribute("Y")]
    public int PositionY { get; set; }

    [XmlElement("Width")]
    public int Width { get; set; }

    [XmlElement("Height")]
    public int Height { get; set; }

    [XmlElement("Background")]
    public string Background { get; set; }

    [XmlElement("Opacity")]
    public int Opacity { get; set; }

    // I also want to allow nested Blocks and Buttons in here, but I **dont** explicitly want to say:
    [XmlArray("Blocks")]
    [XmlArrayItem("Block", typeof(GUIBlock))]
    public GUIBlock[] Blocks { get; set; }
}

Is there any way that I can get an answer which will recursively loop the the item without defining every possible combination?

I don't want to give block a list of blocks and a list of buttons and a button a list of blocks and a list of blocks. And add more options for every new tag.

I could also do it without deserialization and use XPath but then I don't know the information about parent/children if I don't explore it myself. Any help on this one?

Upvotes: 3

Views: 977

Answers (3)

Erwin Okken
Erwin Okken

Reputation: 243

Didn't found the answer that I was looking for because I believe you can't do it with deserialization. So now my Block class also has a list of Blocks, so I can recursively loop them.

Upvotes: 0

Shaun McDonnell
Shaun McDonnell

Reputation: 441

I believe you are asking how can I deserialize an array of objects without having to create a ListNode that contains those items?

For example, you have a requirement that says your XML must look like this:

<Library>
    <Location></Location>
    <Book></Book>
    <Book></Book>
    <Book></Book>
</Library>

And it CANNOT look like this:

<Library>
    <Location></Location>
    <BookCollection>
       <Book></Book>
       <Book></Book>
       <Book></Book>
    <BookCollection>
</Library>

The way you would do this in a C# object is like this:

[Serializable]
public class Library
{
    [XmlElement]
    public string Location {get;set;}

    [XmlElement("Book")]
    public Book[] Book {get; set;}

}

public class Book 
{
    /// ....
}

Upvotes: 1

sircodesalot
sircodesalot

Reputation: 11439

You'll need to create a recursive function to go through each node, but what you can do is just:

// This groups all sub-elements of a node by their name.
// If there is more than one node with the same name, .Count() will return > 1
Int32 numberOfSameNameNodes = 
    node.Elements()
        .GroupBy(element => element.Name)
        .Count(elementsGroupedByName => elementsGroupedByName.Count() > 1);

// if there are duplicately named sub-nodes then 
if (numberOfSameNameNodes > 0)
{
   ...
}

And this will determine if a node has sub-nodes that are duplicates.

Upvotes: 0

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