Serialization Version Management

Question

0.00/5 (No votes)

See more:

Hi,

I'm implementing a project where I have a complex state object which needs to be stored away and at a later date consumed by a number of different services.

The nature of this state object is that it is going to evolve where additional properties are added to the object.

My concern is that older versions of the object are going to fail the deserialization process with each evolution of the object.

I've looked into the use of custom serialization using ISerializable and also aiding the default serialization process by applying the NonSerialized attribute to any new properties.

What I'm hope for is some feedback from developers who've previously faced this type of issue and if they point out some pit falls or problems with either the ISerializable or NonSerialized approach, or perhaps recommend a third approach I haven't yet contemplated?

Posted 31-Jan-13 0:44am

Stephen Hewison

Add a Solution

1 solution

Add a Solution

Add your solution here

Treat my content as plain text, not as HTML

Preview 0

…

Existing Members

Sign in to your account

...or Join us

Download, Vote, Comment, Publish.

Your Email
Password
Forgot your password?

Your Email
This email is in use. Do you need your password?
Optional Password

I have read and agree to the Terms of Service and Privacy Policy
Please subscribe me to the CodeProject newsletters

When answering a question please:

Read the question carefully.
Understand that English isn't everyone's first language so be lenient of bad spelling and grammar.
If a question is poorly phrased then either ask for clarification, ignore it, or edit the question and fix the problem. Insults are not welcome.
Don't tell someone to read the manual. Chances are they have and don't get it. Provide an answer or move on to the next question.

Let's work to help developers, not make them feel stupid.

This content, along with any associated source code and files, is licensed under The Code Project Open License (CPOL)

Stephen Hewison · Accepted Answer · 2013-01-31T00:54:00

In asking my question I found the right terminology to find the answer in google.

From .Net 2.0 onwards the framework has supported "Version Tolerant Serialization".

This provides a number of tools for managing serialisation and deserialisation of object of different versions.

These includes attributes such as OptionalField, OnDeserializing, OnDeserialized, OnSerializing and OnSerialized.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms229752(v=vs.100).aspx[^]