序列化对象列表

Question

I have a list of objects, say List<Topic> I want to serialize them. I am using XmlSerializer and it works fine. But everytime it will serialize and deserialize the whole objects, so won't it affect the performance? The list's items may be removed at any time and once it is removed it should be removed from Xml also.

This is my current serialization code:-

  XmlSerializer serializer = new XmlSerializer(typeof(List<Topic>));
                    serializer.Serialize(somestream, topicList);

To deserialize I would simply write:-

  XmlSerializer serializer = new XmlSerializer(typeof(List<Topic>));
                    topicList = serializer.Deserialize(somestream) as List<Topic>;

Is this technique Ok or can we improve performance? The List typically contains 80-100 items.

Thanks in advance :)

Answer 1

First, have you tested to ensure there is a performance issue?

Second, the XmlSerializer cannot delete the bits of XML that represent the items that have been removed without doing a full serialization to work out what has changed and how that changes the XML.

As such, while the performance may or may not be costly depending on your objects, there is no way to serialize/deserialize only part of the list and only make small modifications to the XML based on items changed.

However, if you are quite regularly serializing/deserializing, and making changes to parts of the list, is it possible in your situation to look at using a database?