Deserialization issue with business object

[Jason]

Hi,

I have a problem serializing and deserializing a business object, expanding on your examples:
http://www.telerik.com/help/wpf/raddiagram-howto-drag-custom-toolboxitem.html (1)
http://www.telerik.com/help/wpf/raddiagram-extensions-toolbox.html#PopulateWithCustomData (2)

Your examples work just fine (when I changed the geometry handling, because of localization issues, I think).
But when I try to add more properties, and serialize them, I get an error deserializing the objects.

After searching, I have now found this thread:
http://www.telerik.com/forums/adding-my-own-properties-into-settingspane-of-raddiagram-on-selection-of-shape (3)
In this thread, Zarko writes (in September 13th 2012):
...
"As for your second question - unfortunately at the moment the RadDiagram supports only string serialization."

I now have to ask: Is this still the case? I would expect serialization to have been handled way before now.
And if this is the case, how can I get around this? Can you come with a solution so that I can handle what I am trying in my example (see below)?

Thank you very much!



I have the full sample project as png files attached, but here is the issue from my point of view:

namespace DeserializationProblem
{
    /// <summary>
    /// Interaction logic for MainWindow.xaml
    /// </summary>
    public partial class MainWindow : Window
    {
        public MainWindow()
        {
            InitializeComponent();
            SerializationService.Default.ItemSerializing += Default_ItemSerializing;
        }

        void Default_ItemSerializing(object sender, SerializationEventArgs<IDiagramItem> e)
        {
            if (e.Entity is RadDiagramShape)
            {
                Geometry g = (e.Entity as RadDiagramShape).Geometry;
                string g_string = GeometryParser.GetString(g);               
                e.SerializationInfo["MyGeometry"] = g_string;
                if ((e.Entity as RadDiagramShape).DataContext is MyShape)
                {
                    e.SerializationInfo["DataContent"] =
                        ((e.Entity as RadDiagramShape).DataContext as MyShape).Header;

                    e.SerializationInfo["DataContent2"] =
                        ((e.Entity as RadDiagramShape).DataContext as MyShape);
                    var test = (MyShape)e.SerializationInfo["DataContent2"];    // <- Works fine
                }
            }
        }

        private void radDiagram1_ShapeDeserialized(object sender, ShapeSerializationRoutedEventArgs e)
        {
            if (e.Shape as RadDiagramShape != null)
            {
                //SerializationInfo e_info = (SerializationInfo)e.SerializationInfo["MyGeometry"];
                string e_info_string = e.SerializationInfo["MyGeometry"].ToString();
                Geometry g = GeometryParser.GetGeometry(e_info_string);               
                (e.Shape as RadDiagramShape).Geometry = g;

                (e.Shape as RadDiagramShape).Content = e.SerializationInfo["DataContent"].ToString(); // <- Works
                var test = (MyShape)e.SerializationInfo["DataContent2"];    // <- Breaks
                // Error: Unable to cast object of type 'System.String' to type 'DeserializationProblem.MyShape'.
                // e.SerializationInfo["DataContent2"] is now a string "DeserializationProblem.MyShape"
            }
        }
    }
}  
 

[Martin Ivanov]

Hi Jason,

The RadDiagram still supports only string serialization and we have no plans to extend this in the near future because a full object serialization is not an easy task and there are already two such implementations - the built-in XMLSerializer and if it doesn't work you can try our PersistenceFramework. I want to ask you why do you need to serialize the whole dataContext object in your scenario ? Why don't you save just some of its properties and create a new object on deserialize:

Copy Code

var newDC = new MyShape();
newDC.Id = int.Parse(e.SerializationInfo["MyId"].ToString());
newDC.String1 = e.SerializationInfo["MyString1"].ToString();
newDC.String2 = e.SerializationInfo["MyString2"].ToString();

If you really need to save the MyShape object you can use the XmlSerializer:

Copy Code

void Default_ItemSerializing(object sender, SerializationEventArgs<IDiagramItem> e)
{
    ...
    XmlSerializer serializer = new XmlSerializer(typeof(MyShape));
    using (var writer = new StringWriter())
    {
        serializer.Serialize(writer, item);
        e.SerializationInfo["DataContent2"] = writer.ToString();
    }
    ...
}

and

Copy Code

private void radDiagram1_ShapeDeserialized(object sender, ShapeSerializationRoutedEventArgs e)
{
    ...
    var test = e.SerializationInfo["DataContent2"].ToString();
    XmlSerializer serializer = new XmlSerializer(typeof(MyShape));
    using (var reader = new StringReader(test))
    {
        var dataContext = serializer.Deserialize(reader);
    }
    ...
}

Please note that you'll have to mark the Geometry property with XmlIgnore because the serializer can't serialize StreamGeometries:

Copy Code

[XmlIgnore]
public Geometry Geometry { get; set; }

I hope I was able to help you and if you have more questions please feel free to ask.

Regards,
Martin
Telerik