Question

I have following XML file format. I want to deserialize following into object, but it does not work. I get problem while deserializing “Field”.

<ExportDefinition>
  <DestinationDir>C:\Export\</DestinationDir>
  <LevelID>102</LevelID>
  <Metadata>
    <Field>
        <Source>CreateDate</Source>
        <DataType>DateTime</DataType>
    <Field>
    <Field>
        <Source>UserName</Source>
        <DataType>Text</DataType>
    <Field>
  </Metadata>
</ExportDefinition>



static void Main(string[] args)
{
   string xmlFile = @"C:\cobra_exp_def.xml";
   FileStream ReadFileStream = new FileStream(xmlFile, FileMode.Open, FileAccess.Read, FileShare.Read);

  XmlSerializer SerializerObj = new XmlSerializer(typeof(ExportDefinition));
  ExportDefinition LoadedObj = (ExportDefinition)SerializerObj.Deserialize(ReadFileStream);

  ReadFileStream.Close();
}

public class ExportDefinition
{
   [XmlElement]
   public string DestinationDir { get; set; }

   [XmlElement]
   public string LevelID { get; set; }
}

public class Metadata
{
   private List<Field> list = new List<Field>();

   [XmlElement]
   public List<Field> Metadata { get { return list; } set { list = value; } }
}

public class Field
{
  [XmlElement]
  public string Source { get; set; }

  [XmlElement]
  public string DataType { get; set; }
}

Solution

Finally have managed it to work with following:

[XmlArray("Metadata"), XmlArrayItem("Field", typeof(Field))]
        public List<Field> Metadata
        {
            get { return (_fields); }
            set { _fields = value; }
        } 

        private List<Field> _fields = new List<Field>();

Answer 1

The InnerException is:

“The ‘Field’ start tag on line 12 position 12 does not match the end tag of ‘Metadata’. Line 13, position 5.”

Which is entirely correct; the xml is invalid. It should be:

<Field>
    <Source>CreateDate</Source>
    <DataType>DateTime</DataType>
</Field>  <!-- EDITED HERE -->
<Field>
    <Source>UserName</Source>
    <DataType>Text</DataType>
</Field>  <!-- EDITED HERE -->

Always look at the InnerException. And if that has an InnerException, look at that too.

You’ll also need to add a Metadata property to ExportDefinition, and use EmlElement("Field")] on the list property inside Metadata.

Or more simply, remove the Metadata class completely:

public class ExportDefinition
{
   [XmlElement]
   public string DestinationDir { get; set; }

   [XmlElement]
   public string LevelID { get; set; }

   private List<Field> list = new List<Field>();

   [XmlArray("Metadata")]
   [XmlArrayItem("Field")]
   public List<Field> Items { get { return list; } }
}