How to XML-serialize a dictionary

Question

I have been able to serialize an IEnumerable this way:

[XmlArray("TRANSACTIONS")] [XmlArrayItem("TRANSACTION", typeof(Record))] public IEnumerable<BudgetRecord> Records {     get      {         foreach(Record br in _budget)         {             yield return br;         }     } } 

However, I realised that now I need a dictionary containing a collection Dictionary<string, RecordCollection> (RecordCollection implements IEnumerable).

How can I achieve that?

Answer 1

Take a look at the following blog post

• http://blogs.msdn.com/b/psheill/archive/2005/04/09/406823.aspx
• http://web.archive.org/web/20100703052446/http://blogs.msdn.com/b/psheill/archive/2005/04/09/406823.aspx

and this one (not in english, but the code is useful)

• http://huseyint.com/2007/12/xml-serializable-generic-dictionary-tipi/

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Code sample from: http://web.archive.org/web/20100703052446/http://blogs.msdn.com/b/psheill/archive/2005/04/09/406823.aspx

using System.Collections.Generic; using System.Collections; using System.IO; using System.Xml.Serialization; using System.Xml; using System; public static void Serialize(TextWriter writer, IDictionary dictionary) {     List<Entry> entries = new List<Entry>(dictionary.Count);     foreach (object key in dictionary.Keys)     {         entries.Add(new Entry(key, dictionary[key]));     }     XmlSerializer serializer = new XmlSerializer(typeof(List<Entry>));     serializer.Serialize(writer, entries); } public static void Deserialize(TextReader reader, IDictionary dictionary) {     dictionary.Clear();     XmlSerializer serializer = new XmlSerializer(typeof(List<Entry>));     List<Entry> list = (List<Entry>)serializer.Deserialize(reader);     foreach (Entry entry in list)     {         dictionary[entry.Key] = entry.Value;     } } public class Entry {     public object Key;     public object Value;     public Entry()     {     }      public Entry(object key, object value)     {         Key = key;         Value = value;     } } 

It generates output like the following, when the keys and values are strings.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <ArrayOfEntry xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema">   <Entry>     <Key xsi:type="xsd:string">MyKey</Key>     <Value xsi:type="xsd:string">MyValue</Value>     </Entry>   <Entry>         <Key xsi:type="xsd:string">MyOtherKey</Key>         <Value xsi:type="xsd:string">MyOtherValue</Value>     </Entry> </ArrayOfEntry>