How to make Json.Net skip serialization of empty collections

Question

I have an object that contains several properties that are a List of strings List<String> or a dictionary of strings Dictionary<string,string>. I want to serialize the object to json using Json.net and I want to have the least amount of text generated.

I am using the DefaultValueHandling and NullValueHandling to set default values to strings and integers. But how can I define the DefaultValueHandling to ignore the property in the serialized output if it is initialized to an empty List<String> or Dictionary<string,string>?

Some sample output is:

{
 "Value1": "my value",
 "Value2": 3,
 "List1": [],
 "List2": []
}

I want to get a result that ignores the two lists in the above example, because they are set to the default value of an empty list.

Any help will be appreciated

Answer 1

Another very simple solution is to implement a ShouldSerialize* method in the type being serialized as outline here.

This might be the preferred way if you're in control of the type being serialized and if it is not a general behavior you want to introduce.