TheSharkysNL/Serializer

provides serialization source generation for csharp

What does this serializer do?

This serializer converts a type into their binary form and stores it in this way.

Example:

This

public partial class MyClass
{
    private char var1 = 'C';
    public string var2 = "this is MyClass";
}

Is converted into

"C\x001\x00FThis is MyClass"

How to use it

The Serializer source code must be downloaded from github. Once downloaded, within the project that you want to use add these project references to your .csproj file:

<ItemGroup>
    <ProjectReference Include="{PathToDownloadedCode}\Serializer.Generator\Serializer.Generator.csproj" OutputItemType="Analyzer" ReferenceOutputAssembly="false" />
    <ProjectReference Include="{PathToDownloadedCode}\Serializer\Serializer.csproj" />
</ItemGroup>

Whilst using the Serializer namespace, add the ISerializable interface to the type you want to serialize. The type that you add the interface to must be partial.

using Serializer;

public partial class MyClass : ISerializable<MyClass>
{
    // your fields and properties here
    // no need to implement the interface
    // if you implement the interface it must be partially implemented, like:
    // public partial long Serialize(string filename) 
}

Now you can call the Serialize and Deserialize functions using a file or stream as argument

Test.MyClass myClass = new();
myClass.Serialize("/test.txt");

Test.MyClass myClass2 = Test.MyClass.Deserialize(new FileStream("/test.txt", FileMode.Open));

Limitations

Namespace

A type that implements ISerializable must reside in a namespace. Else an error will occurre.

namespace MyNamespace
{
    public partial class MyClass : ISerializable<MyClass>
    {
    }
}

Collections

A collection type that only implements IReadOnlyCollection and not ICollection must have a method called Add which returns a new instance of itself with the added item. Or the serializable type that uses the collection must cast it to it's IReadOnlyCollection type.

namespace MyNamespace
{
    public class MyCollection<T> : IReadOnlyCollection<T>
    {
        public partial MyCollection<T> Add(T value);
    }

    public partial class MyClass : ISerializable<MyClass>
    {
        public MyCollection<int> collection;
    }
}

or

namespace MyNamespace
{
    public class MyCollection<T> : IReadOnlyCollection<T>
    {
    }

    public partial class MyClass : ISerializable<MyClass>
    {
        public IReadOnlyCollection<int> collection;
    }
}

No collection types currently work that don't use this above