Question

Situation: When I deserialize XML that contains carriage returns, the characters appear as unprintable character “boxes” rather than as carriage returns.

Background: User input collected via a multi-line textbox contains carriage returns within the text. I am persisting this text data to XML using the .NET XML serializer (snippet below). When I later de-serialize the XML data and bind it back to the multi-line textbox, the carriage return characters render as unprintable “boxes”.

I know Windows uses a carriage return + line feed to indicate an end-of-line. I think that the XML serializing may be altering the data (possibly stripping the carriage return?).

Question: Any ideas how can I get the deserialized carriage returns to render properly?

Thanks in advance, -Ed

Serialization Snippet

Public Sub SaveApplicationOptions(ByVal AppOptions As ApplicationOptions) Implements IApplicationOptionsRepository.SaveApplicationOptions
  Dim serializer As New XmlSerializer(GetType(ApplicationOptions))
  Dim ApplicationOptionsFilename As String = ConfigurationManager.AppSettings("ApplicationOptionsXML")
  Dim sw As New StreamWriter(ApplicationOptionsFilename)
  serializer.Serialize(sw, AppOptions)
  sw.Close()
  sw.Dispose()
End Sub

Answer 1

Another approach is to use the XmlAttribute(), as mentioned here. For example:

Imports System.Xml.Serialization

Public Class ApplicationOptions

    Private _someText As String = String.Empty

    <XmlAttribute()> _
    Public Property SomeText() As String
        Get
            Return _someText
        End Get
        Set(ByVal value As String)
            _someText = value
        End Set
    End Property

End Class

I just tried it on a sample app and the linefeed characters were not replaced during de-serialisation.