Question

I have an ASP MVC Web Api project that outputs json using json.net. I have for example the following models:

public class ModelA
{
    public int Id {get;set;}
    public string Name {get;set;}

    [JsonIgnore]
    public int TypeModelId {get;set;}
    public virtual TypeModel TypeModel {get;set;}
}

public class TypeModel
{
    [JsonIgnore]
    public int Id {get;set;}

    public string Name {get;set;}

    [JsonIgnore]
    public virtual IList<ModelA> ModelAs {get;set;}
}

When I serialize a ModelA the output will be something like this:

[
  {
    "Id": 1,
    "Name": "test",
    "TypeModel": {
      "Name": "testtype1"
    }
  }
]

Is it possible using json.net to have an output like this..

[
  {
    "Id": 1,
    "Name": "test",
    "TypeModel": "testtype1"
  }
]

..or do I have to copy the contents of ModelA to a new class which stores the TypeModel relation as string instead of reference? Maybe there are better solutions?

Answer 1

As you say the only way to do this is with a DTO. This is because, as you indicated, the type of TypeModel is a class TypeModel and not a string. If you are using Linq you could also just use an anonymous type in the following way.

return db.ModelAs.Single(x=>x.Id == id).Select(x=> new{
    x.Id,
    x.Name,
    TypeModel = x.TypeModel.Name
});