How To: Serialize your DataTable to Silverlight using WCF service

Did you know that you can serialize any DataTable to Silverlight easily from your custom WCF service in very few lines of code?

[OperationContract]
public IEnumerable<Dictionary<string, object>> GetData()
{
    var table = YourDataTable;

    var columns = table.Columns.Cast<DataColumn>();

    return table.AsEnumerable().Select(r => columns.Select(c =>
                         new { Column = c.ColumnName, Value = r[c] })
                     .ToDictionary(i => i.Column, i => i.Value != DBNull.Value ? i.Value : null));
}

 

I’ve made small update for my lightweight DataTable for Silverlight and now you can create the table directly from IEnumerable<Dictionary<string, object>>:

namespace Telerik.Data
{
    public class DataTable : IEnumerable
    {
        public DataTable(IEnumerable<Dictionary<string, object>> source)
        {
            ...
        }

    }

}

Now you can use all these to serialize any DataTable with unknown number of columns and types to the Silverlight client and bind desired control:

XAML

<UserControl x:Class="SilverlightApplication1.MainPage"
    xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation" 
    xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
    xmlns:d="http://schemas.microsoft.com/expression/blend/2008" xmlns:mc="http://schemas.openxmlformats.org/markup-compatibility/2006" 
    mc:Ignorable="d" d:DesignWidth="640" d:DesignHeight="480"
    xmlns:telerik="clr-namespace:Telerik.Windows.Controls;assembly=Telerik.Windows.Controls.GridView">
    <Grid x:Name="LayoutRoot">
        <telerik:RadGridView x:Name="RadGridView1" />
    </Grid>
</UserControl>

C#

using System.Windows.Controls;
using SilverlightApplication1.ServiceReference1;
using Telerik.Data;

namespace SilverlightApplication1
{
    public partial class MainPage : UserControl
    {
        public MainPage()
        {
            InitializeComponent();

            var client = new MyServiceClient();
            client.GetDataCompleted += (s,e) => 
            {
                RadGridView1.ItemsSource = new DataTable(e.Result);
            };

            client.GetDataAsync("SELECT CustomerID, CompanyName, ContactName, City, Country, Address, Fax FROM Customers");
        }
    }
}

The result - fully functional dynamic DataGrid and DataTable:
 

Enjoy!