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Process of Serialization and Deserialization.

• Just like Java, in C# language too, we can save the state of an object, including value of its instance variables in a file, by a process of Serialization. The saved form of object is called serialized object.


• Post-serialization, you can transfer the file containing serialized form of an object to a destination of your choice.


• At the destination, you can restore the object from its serialized form by a restoration process called Deserialization. The restored object and its instance variables will have the same value, which they had at the time of Serialization.

Methods used in Serialization and Deserialization

The process of "serialization" and "deserialization" is performed using two methods of BinaryFormatter, which serializes and deserializes an object, or an entire graph of connected objects, in binary format. These methods of BinaryFormatter are -:

Methods	Description
Serialize(Stream stream, Object object)	This method of BinaryFormatter, writes the state of the specified object to the specified stream, so that it can be saved in a file, and thus performing serialization.
Deserialize(Stream stream)	This method of BinaryFormatter, reads the saved object from the specified stream(which is used to refer to a file in which the state of object was written to) and thus performing deserialization.

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Note :

• To serialize an object of a specific class, you need to apply Serializable attribute to the same class. Not doing so, thrown the SerializationException exception at the runtime.

Program with Serialization and Deserialization :

//C# Example of Serialization and Deserialization


using System;
using System.IO;
using System.Runtime.Serialization.Formatters.Binary; 


[Serializable]
class SerialEx
{
//An instance variable of the class
int i=0;

//Defining the Main() method of class
public static void Main(String[] ar)
{
	//Creating an object of SerialEx class
	SerialEx ob= new SerialEx();

	//Setting the instance variable i of the object to 10
	ob.i=10;

	
	Console.WriteLine("Before Serialization the instance variable of the object has a value : " + ob.i);

	try
	{
		//Creating an object of FileStream to write to a file
		//We are going to use the FileMode OpenOrCreate to create a new file to write the saved form of object to
		FileStream fs = new FileStream("E:\\File.ser", FileMode.OpenOrCreate);

		//Creating an object of BinaryFormatter
		BinaryFormatter bf = new BinaryFormatter();

		//Serializing, i.e. saving the state of this object, ob
		bf.Serialize(fs, ob);


		//Closing the FileStream after writing the saved state of object to the associated file
		fs.Close();
	}
	catch(Exception exp)
	{
		Console.WriteLine(exp + " while performing serialization");
	}
	
	try
	{
		//Creating an object of FileStream to write to a file
		//We are going to use the FileMode.Open mode to open the existing file to read the saved form of object from it
		FileStream fs = new FileStream("E:\\File.ser", FileMode.Open);

		//Creating an object of BinaryFormatter
		BinaryFormatter bf = new BinaryFormatter();

		//Deserializing, i.e. restoring the object to its original state.
		SerialEx ob2 = (SerialEx)bf.Deserialize(fs);

		//Closing the FileStream after reading the saved state of object from its associated file
		fs.Close();

		Console.WriteLine("After Deserialization restored object's instance variable has a value : "+ ob2.i);
	}
	catch(Exception exp)
	{
		Console.WriteLine(exp + " while performing deserialization"));
	}

}
}

Output is -:

Before Serialization the instance variable of the object has a value : 10
After Deserialization restored object's instance variable has a value : 10

Program Analysis

In this code above, we are performing Serialization by calling the Serialize() method of BinaryFormatter class, and saving the state of an object and its instance variable's value of int 10 in a file at path E:\\File.ser.

This serialized object is then deserialized by calling Deserialzie() method of BinaryFormatter class, which reads the serialized saved object, using which the original object is reconstucted with its instance variable having the same value 10, which it had at the time of Serialization.

Note :

Method Deserialize() returns the serialized object contained in an object of Object class, which is a parent class of all C# classes, therefore, casting of this object to a type of original object is required to reconstruct the original object.

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