Question

I have a simple class:

public class site
        {
            public string URL { get; set; }
        }

That exists within a http handler. Currently I am posting json to this handler and trying to deserialize it to get the URL out of the string. I am however having a problem with the deserialize part of it.

I have a string “jsonString” that has the json formatted like so:

[{"URL":"http://www.google.com/etc/"}]

Here is my code for the deserialize:

JavaScriptSerializer jsonSerializer = new JavaScriptSerializer();

        string jsonString = String.Empty;

        HttpContext.Current.Request.InputStream.Position = 0;
        using (StreamReader inputStream = new StreamReader(HttpContext.Current.Request.InputStream))
        {
            jsonString = inputStream.ReadToEnd();
        }

        site currSite = new site();
        currSite = jsonSerializer.Deserialize<site>(jsonString);

        //set response types
        HttpContext.Current.Response.ContentType = "application/json";
        HttpContext.Current.Response.ContentEncoding = Encoding.UTF8;


       //send response 
       HttpContext.Current.Response.Write(jsonSerializer.Serialize(currSite.URL));  

I am then trying to send a response using currSite.URL however it is failing. What am I missing here? I am reasonably confident it is at the deserialize part because if I send a response of jsonString instead of currSite.URL it will work.

Answer 1

Your json string shows that it’s an array, not a single entity. You should deserialize it as so:

var result = jsonSerializer.Deserialize<site[]>(jsonString);

And result[0].Url should contain what you are looking for.

Update

Adding sample code:

 string json = @"[{""URL"":""http://www.google.com/etc/""}]";

 JavaScriptSerializer js = new JavaScriptSerializer();
 var result = js.Deserialize<site[]>(json);
 Console.WriteLine(result[0].URL);

Prints:
http://www.google.com/etc/