Change the name of the class being serialized in .Net?

Question

I can map incoming class names by using a SerializationBinder and overriding the BindToType method, but I found no way of changing the name of the class in the serialization process. Is it possible at all??

EDIT:

I am referring to the serialization using the System.Runtime.Serialization, and not the System.Xml.Serialization.

Thanks!

Answer 1

I'm not sure if I follow you, but you could use XmlTypeAttribute. You can then easily retrieve its values through reflection.

[XmlType(Namespace = "myNamespaceThatWontChange",
TypeName = "myClassThatWontChange")]
public class Person
{
   public string Name;
}

Check this out:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.xml.serialization.xmltypeattribute%28VS.100%29.aspx

Answer 2

You can do it with attributes:

[System.Xml.Serialization.XmlRoot("xmlName")]
public Class ClassName
{
}

Answer 3

Look at using a surrogate + surrogate selector. That together with a binder on the deserialization should do the trick.

Answer 4

I found out that I can use the SerializationInfo object that comes in the GetObjectData function, and change the AssemblyName and FullTypeName properties, so that when I deserialize I can use a SerializationBinder to map the custom assembly and type-name back to a valid type. Here is a semple:

Serializable class:

[Serializable]
class MyCustomClass : ISerializable
{
    string _field;
    void MyCustomClass(SerializationInfo info, StreamingContext context)
    {
        this._field = info.GetString("PropertyName");
    }
    void ISerializable.GetObjectData(SerializationInfo info, StreamingContext context)
    {
        info.AssemblyName = "MyCustomAssemblyIdentifier";
        info.FullTypeName = "MyCustomTypeIdentifier";
        info.AddValue("PropertyName", this._field);
    }
}

SerializationBinder:

public class MyBinder : SerializationBinder
{
    public override Type BindToType(string assemblyName, string typeName)
    {
        if (assemblyName == "MyCustomAssemblyIdentifier")
            if (typeName == "MyCustomTypeIdentifier")
                return typeof();
        return null;
    }
}

Serialization code:

var fs = GetStream();
BinaryFormatter f = new BinaryFormatter();
f.Binder = new MyBinder();
var obj = (MyCustomClass)f.Deserialize(fs);

Deserialization code:

var fs = GetStream();
MyCustomClass obj = GetObjectToSerialize();
BinaryFormatter f = new BinaryFormatter();
f.Deserialize(fs, obj);