How to define a string array element to a cdata node in xml x#

Question

I need to serialize a class to XML which looks like

<Dummy>
  <Definition>
  </Definition>
  <Example><![CDATA[0401010101010101]]></Example>
  <Example><![CDATA[0401010101010101]]></Example>
  <Example><![CDATA[0401010101010101]]></Example>      
</Dummy>

The number of "Example" nodes can vary from 3 nodes to n number of nodes. So i need to define it as a string array in my xml class. How should my class look like ???

I saw an example online for a string:

[XmlIgnore]
public string Example { get; set; }

[XmlElement("Example")]
public System.Xml.XmlCDataSection MyStringCDATA
{
    get
    {
        return new System.Xml.XmlDocument().CreateCDataSection(Example);
    }
    set
    {
        Example = value.Value;
    }
}

But I have a string array.

How do I define it?

Answer 1

This is the only class you need to read in the List of strings (Example).

[XmlRoot(ElementName = "Dummy")]
public class Dummy
{
    [XmlElement(ElementName = "Definition")]
    public string Definition { get; set; }
    [XmlElement(ElementName = "Example")]
    public List<string> Example { get; set; }
}

Usage:

XmlSerializer serializer = new XmlSerializer(typeof(Dummy));
Dummy obj = (Dummy)serializer.Deserialize(new StreamReader(filename));
List<string> examples = obj.Example;
examples.ForEach(x => Console.WriteLine(x));

Output

0401010101010101
0401010101010101
0401010101010101

---

Alternate

If you are looking to get the entire value within example, you will have to do something like this. Reason behind that is values are surrounded with <> which makes the value an element (without an end tag).

XDocument xdoc = XDocument.Parse(xmlString);
var objects = xdoc.Root.Elements().Where(x => x.Name.ToString().Equals("Example")).ToList();
objects.ForEach(x => Console.WriteLine(x.FirstNode.ToString()));

which produces the output of:

<![CDATA[0401010101010101]]>
<![CDATA[0401010101010101]]>
<![CDATA[0401010101010101]]>