JavaScriptSerializer.Deserialize - how to change field names

Question

I took another try at it, using the DataContractJsonSerializer class. This solves it:

The code looks like this:

using System.Runtime.Serialization;

[DataContract]
public class DataObject
{
    [DataMember(Name = "user_id")]
    public int UserId { get; set; }

    [DataMember(Name = "detail_level")]
    public string DetailLevel { get; set; }
}

And the test is:

using System.Runtime.Serialization.Json;

[TestMethod]
public void DataObjectSimpleParseTest()
{
        DataContractJsonSerializer serializer = new DataContractJsonSerializer(typeof(DataObject));

        MemoryStream ms = new MemoryStream(Encoding.Unicode.GetBytes(JsonData));
        DataObject dataObject = serializer.ReadObject(ms) as DataObject;

        Assert.IsNotNull(dataObject);
        Assert.AreEqual("low", dataObject.DetailLevel);
        Assert.AreEqual(1234, dataObject.UserId);
}

The only drawback is that I had to change DetailLevel from an enum to a string - if you keep the enum type in place, the DataContractJsonSerializer expects to read a numeric value and fails. See DataContractJsonSerializer and Enums for further details.

In my opinion this is quite poor, especially as JavaScriptSerializer handles it correctly. This is the exception that you get trying to parse a string into an enum:

System.Runtime.Serialization.SerializationException: There was an error deserializing the object of type DataObject. The value 'low' cannot be parsed as the type 'Int64'. --->
System.Xml.XmlException: The value 'low' cannot be parsed as the type 'Int64'. --->  
System.FormatException: Input string was not in a correct format

And marking up the enum like this does not change this behaviour:

[DataContract]
public enum DetailLevel
{
    [EnumMember(Value = "low")]
    Low,
   ...
 }

This also seems to work in Silverlight.

By creating a custom JavaScriptConverter you can map any name to any property. But it does require hand coding the map, which is less than ideal.

public class DataObjectJavaScriptConverter : JavaScriptConverter
{
    private static readonly Type[] _supportedTypes = new[]
    {
        typeof( DataObject )
    };

    public override IEnumerable<Type> SupportedTypes 
    { 
        get { return _supportedTypes; } 
    }

    public override object Deserialize( IDictionary<string, object> dictionary, 
                                        Type type, 
                                        JavaScriptSerializer serializer )
    {
        if( type == typeof( DataObject ) )
        {
            var obj = new DataObject();
            if( dictionary.ContainsKey( "user_id" ) )
                obj.UserId = serializer.ConvertToType<int>( 
                                           dictionary["user_id"] );
            if( dictionary.ContainsKey( "detail_level" ) )
                obj.DetailLevel = serializer.ConvertToType<DetailLevel>(
                                           dictionary["detail_level"] );

            return obj;
        }

        return null;
    }

    public override IDictionary<string, object> Serialize( 
            object obj, 
            JavaScriptSerializer serializer )
    {
        var dataObj = obj as DataObject;
        if( dataObj != null )
        {
            return new Dictionary<string,object>
            {
                {"user_id", dataObj.UserId },
                {"detail_level", dataObj.DetailLevel }
            }
        }
        return new Dictionary<string, object>();
    }
}

Then you can deserialize like so:

var serializer = new JavaScriptSerializer();
serialzer.RegisterConverters( new[]{ new DataObjectJavaScriptConverter() } );
var dataObj = serializer.Deserialize<DataObject>( json );

Json.NET will do what you want (disclaimer: I'm the author of the package). It supports reading DataContract/DataMember attributes as well as its own to change the property names. Also there is the StringEnumConverter class for serializing enum values as the name rather than the number.

There is no standard support for renaming properties in JavaScriptSerializer however you can quite easily add your own:

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Text;
using System.Web.Script.Serialization;
using System.Reflection;

public class JsonConverter : JavaScriptConverter
{
    public override object Deserialize(IDictionary<string, object> dictionary, Type type, JavaScriptSerializer serializer)
    {
        List<MemberInfo> members = new List<MemberInfo>();
        members.AddRange(type.GetFields());
        members.AddRange(type.GetProperties().Where(p => p.CanRead && p.CanWrite && p.GetIndexParameters().Length == 0));

        object obj = Activator.CreateInstance(type);

        foreach (MemberInfo member in members)
        {
            JsonPropertyAttribute jsonProperty = (JsonPropertyAttribute)Attribute.GetCustomAttribute(member, typeof(JsonPropertyAttribute));

            if (jsonProperty != null && dictionary.ContainsKey(jsonProperty.Name))
            {
                SetMemberValue(serializer, member, obj, dictionary[jsonProperty.Name]);
            }
            else if (dictionary.ContainsKey(member.Name))
            {
                SetMemberValue(serializer, member, obj, dictionary[member.Name]);
            }
            else
            {
                KeyValuePair<string, object> kvp = dictionary.FirstOrDefault(x => string.Equals(x.Key, member.Name, StringComparison.InvariantCultureIgnoreCase));

                if (!kvp.Equals(default(KeyValuePair<string, object>)))
                {
                    SetMemberValue(serializer, member, obj, kvp.Value);
                }
            }
        }

        return obj;
    }


    private void SetMemberValue(JavaScriptSerializer serializer, MemberInfo member, object obj, object value)
    {
        if (member is PropertyInfo)
        {
            PropertyInfo property = (PropertyInfo)member;                
            property.SetValue(obj, serializer.ConvertToType(value, property.PropertyType), null);
        }
        else if (member is FieldInfo)
        {
            FieldInfo field = (FieldInfo)member;
            field.SetValue(obj, serializer.ConvertToType(value, field.FieldType));
        }
    }


    public override IDictionary<string, object> Serialize(object obj, JavaScriptSerializer serializer)
    {
        Type type = obj.GetType();
        List<MemberInfo> members = new List<MemberInfo>();
        members.AddRange(type.GetFields());
        members.AddRange(type.GetProperties().Where(p => p.CanRead && p.CanWrite && p.GetIndexParameters().Length == 0));

        Dictionary<string, object> values = new Dictionary<string, object>();

        foreach (MemberInfo member in members)
        {
            JsonPropertyAttribute jsonProperty = (JsonPropertyAttribute)Attribute.GetCustomAttribute(member, typeof(JsonPropertyAttribute));

            if (jsonProperty != null)
            {
                values[jsonProperty.Name] = GetMemberValue(member, obj);
            }
            else
            {
                values[member.Name] = GetMemberValue(member, obj);
            }
        }

        return values;
    }

    private object GetMemberValue(MemberInfo member, object obj)
    {
        if (member is PropertyInfo)
        {
            PropertyInfo property = (PropertyInfo)member;
            return property.GetValue(obj, null);
        }
        else if (member is FieldInfo)
        {
            FieldInfo field = (FieldInfo)member;
            return field.GetValue(obj);
        }

        return null;
    }


    public override IEnumerable<Type> SupportedTypes
    {
        get 
        {
            return new[] { typeof(DataObject) };
        }
    }
}

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Linq;
using System.Text;

[AttributeUsage(AttributeTargets.Field | AttributeTargets.Property)]
public class JsonPropertyAttribute : Attribute
{
    public JsonPropertyAttribute(string name)
    {
        Name = name;
    }

    public string Name
    {
        get;
        set;
    }
}

The DataObject class then becomes:

public class DataObject
{
    [JsonProperty("user_id")]
    public int UserId { get; set; }

    [JsonProperty("detail_level")]
    public DetailLevel DetailLevel { get; set; }
}

I appreicate this might be a little late but thought other people wanting to use the JavaScriptSerializer rather than the DataContractJsonSerializer might appreciate it.