XmlSerializer deserialize attribute with empty string to zero

Question

I would like to use XmlSerializer and deserialize attributes with empty string values into zeros for ints. Every question I've seen regarding deserializing attributes with empty strings involves setting nullable ints to null - but I want to set non-nullable ints to zero, not null.

Is there any easy way to do this without implementing IXmlSerializable and just handling it all myself?

Answer 1

One approach could be to configure a dummy serializable property, and use a different property in practice:

private int myint;

[XmlIgnore]
public int MyInt { get; set; }

[XmlElement("MyInt")]
public string MyIntString
{
    get { return this.MyInt.ToString(); }
    set { this.MyInt = Convert.ToInt32(value ?? string.Empty); }
}