FluentSerialization

A simple fluent API for the most common serialization tasks.

Access the API using the With class. This provides the methods required to work with objects, strings and byte arrays.

Once finished, use the Value property to access the result obtained from executing all the serialization tasks.

You can download the NuGet package from NuGet.org

Strategies

Each serialization task is implemented using one of the following interfaces:

• IEncodingStrategy provides methods to encode/decode strings using a specific encoding, e.g. UTF8
• ISerializationStrategy provides methods to serialize/deserialize objects using a specific serializer, e.g. JSON
• ICompressionStrategy provides methods to compress/decompress byte arrays using a specific algorithm, e.g. GZip
• IEncryptionStrategy provides methods to encrypt/decrypt byte arrays, using a specific algorithm, e.g. AES

The IStrategies interface combines all of the above in a single convenient place. An implementation of this can then be provided to the fluent API. If an implementation is not provided, the API will default to UTF8 for encoding, JSON for serialization and pass thru for compression and encryption, i.e. don't compress or encrypt.

And since a picture paints a thousand words... :)

Examples

A picture may paint a thousand words, but nothing beats a code example! :)

var secretAgent = new SecretAgent { Id = "007", Name = "Bond. James Bond" };

// serialize the specified SecretAgent instance to a JSON string, i.e.
// {"Name":"Bond. James Bond","Id":"007"}
string jsonAgent = With.Object<SecretAgent>(secretAgent).Serialize().Value;

// deserialize the specified JSON string into a new SecretAgent instance
SecretAgent originalAgent = With.String(jsonAgent).Deserialize<SecretAgent>().Value;

// encode the specified SecretAgent instance to a byte array
byte[] binaryAgent = With.Object<SecretAgent>(secretAgent).Serialize().Encode().Value;

// same as above + convert to base64 string, e.g. for storage or transmission, i.e.
// eyJOYW1lIjoiQm9uZC4gSmFtZXMgQm9uZCIsIklkIjoiMDA3In0=
string base64Agent = With.Object<SecretAgent>(secretAgent).Serialize().Encode().ToBase64().Value;

// this is the same as binaryAgent above, because the default compression strategy is to pass thru
byte[] notCompressedAgent = With.Object<SecretAgent>(secretAgent).Serialize().Encode().Compress().Value;

// TestStrategies implements IStrategies and is used to specify a set of strategies to use
var opt = new TestStrategies
{
    Encoding = new Utf16EncodingStrategy(),
    Encryption = new AesEncryptionStrategy(privateKey),
    Compression = new GZipCompressionStrategy(),
    Serialization = new XmlSerializationStrategy()
};

// now this is actually compressed, because a compression strategy was specified using the opt parameter 
byte[] compressedAgent = With.Object<SecretAgent>(secretAgent, opt).Serialize().Encode().Compress().Value;

// serialize the specified SecretAgent to an XML string, i.e.
// <Root><Name>Bond. James Bond</Name><Id>007</Id></Root>
string xmlAgent = With.Object<SecretAgent>(secretAgent, opt).Serialize().Value;

// encode the specified SecretAgent to a byte array and encrypt
byte[] encryptedAgent = With.Object<SecretAgent>(secretAgent, opt).Serialize().Encode().Encrypt().Value;

// decrypt and decode the encrypted byte array obtained above
SecretAgent decryptedAgent = With.Bytes(encryptedAgent, opt).Decrypt().Decode().Deserialize<SecretAgent>().Value;