Question

In my class i’ve got:

[DataMember(Name = "jsonMemberName", EmitDefaultValue = false, 
    IsRequired = false)]
public List<string> Member { get; set; }

After passing the object through controller’s Json(obj) that retruns System.Web.Mvc.JsonResult: i’ve got serialized json: {Member:…} but not {jsonMemberName:…}, so it doesn’t look at DataMember(Name = “jsonMemberName”).

If I use serialization from System.Runtime.Serialization.Json everithing’s works fine as expected.

What can be wrong?

Answer 1

The JsonResult action which you are returning from the controller action (using return Json(...)) internally relies on the JavaScriptSerializer class. This class doesn’t take into account any DataMember attributes on your model.

You could write a custom ActionResult which uses the serializer in the System.Runtime.Serialization.Json namespace.

For example:

public class MyJsonResult : JsonResult
{
    public override void ExecuteResult(ControllerContext context)
    {
        var response = context.HttpContext.Response;
        if (!string.IsNullOrEmpty(ContentType))
        {
            response.ContentType = ContentType;
        }
        else
        {
            response.ContentType = "application/json";
        }
        if (ContentEncoding != null)
        {
            response.ContentEncoding = this.ContentEncoding;
        }
        if (Data != null)
        {
            var serializer = new DataContractJsonSerializer(Data.GetType());
            serializer.WriteObject(response.OutputStream, Data);
        }
    }
}

and then in your controller action:

public ActionResult Foo()
{
    var model = ...
    return new MyJsonResult { Data = model };
}