Question

We have a JSON object with one of the object having a dash in its name. Ex below.

{
    "veg": [
        {
            "id": "3",
            "name": "Vegetables",
            "count": "25"
        },
        {
            "id": "4",
            "name": "Dal",
            "count": "2"
        },
        {
            "id": "5",
            "name": "Rice",
            "count": "8"
        },
        {
            "id": "7",
            "name": "Breads",
            "count": "6"
        },
        {
            "id": "9",
            "name": "Meals",
            "count": "3"
        },
        {
            "id": "46",
            "name": "Extras",
            "count": "10"
        }
    ],
    "non-veg": [
        {
            "id": "25",
            "name": "Starters",
            "count": "9"
        },
        {
            "id": "30",
            "name": "Gravies",
            "count": "13"
        },
        {
            "id": "50",
            "name": "Rice",
            "count": "4"
        }
    ]
}

How can we deserialize this json?

Answer 1

You can achieve this by using DataContractJsonSerializer

[DataContract]
public class Item
{
    [DataMember(Name = "id")]
    public int Id { get; set; }
    [DataMember(Name = "name")]
    public string Name { get; set; }
    [DataMember(Name = "count")]
    public int Count { get; set; }
}

[DataContract]
public class ItemCollection
{
    [DataMember(Name = "veg")]
    public IEnumerable<Item> Vegetables { get; set; }
    [DataMember(Name = "non-veg")]
    public IEnumerable<Item> NonVegetables { get; set; }
}

now you can deserialize it with something like this:

string data;

// fill the json in data variable

ItemCollection collection;
using (MemoryStream ms = new MemoryStream(Encoding.Unicode.GetBytes(data)))
{
    DataContractJsonSerializer serializer = new DataContractJsonSerializer(typeof(ItemCollection));
    collection = (ItemCollection)serializer.ReadObject(ms);
}