Question

I have some object classes that use inheritance. It seems that I can only get access to the objects that are directly used by a service. Let me show you what I am trying to accomplish:

[DataContract] public class Object1 {    [DataMember]    int Id {get; set;} }  [DataContract] public class object2: Object1 {    [DataMember]    string Name {get; set;} }  [DataContract] public class object3  {     [DataMember]     int SomeNumber {get; set;} } 

The Service:

public int GetId(object2 obj) {     return GetTheId(object2.Name); } 

Now since I am using object2 in the service, object1 gets serialized too. Howerver, I may want to have object3 exposed for some reason. It may be a derived class that I have to pass so that its type can be determined later for another process. I do not see this object getting serialized. I assumed that whenever you set the DataContract / DataMember those objects would get serialized. It does make sense not to expose something that is not begin used, becuase I can see an issue with exposing items you may not need. What is the best way to expose objects that are not directly used by a service? Thanks

Daniel

Answer 1

You should decorate object2 (peculiar name for a class :)) with the KnownType attribute:

[DataContract] [KnownType(typeof(object3))] public class object2  { } 

Assuming you mean object3 is a subclass of object2:

public class object3: object2 { }