XML class generator for serialization

Question

Is there an easy way to construct class from a XML. The constructed class will be used to serialize and deserialize XML.

I have an XML with lots of properties and elements defined. Do I need to manually create my class based on that XML? Or Is there a utility tool available to generate class from XML

Thanks,

Esen

Answer 1

@Willem van Rumpt: solution helped me to generate class. But in some case when I try to instantiate the dataset, I end up receiving this exception "Same Table cannot be the child table in two nested relations..."

I have tried different solution using xmldocument object to navigate each nodes and generate my class that can be used to serialize and deserialize xml file. Thought to post it here so that it would be helpful to someone who is looking for similar solution. Please post your optimized solution if you have one.

namespace Utility1 
{
public static class XMLHelper
{
   private enum XMLType
   {
      Element,
      Attribute
   }
    public static string GenerateXMLClass(string xmlstring)
    {
        XmlDocument xd = new XmlDocument();
        xd.LoadXml(xmlstring);
        XmlNode rootNode = xd.DocumentElement;
        var xmlClassCollection = new Dictionary<string, XMLClass>();
        var xmlClass = new XMLClass();
        xmlClassCollection.Add(rootNode.Name, xmlClass);
        CollectAttributes(ref xmlClass, rootNode);
        CollectElements(ref xmlClass, rootNode);
        CollectChildClass(ref xmlClassCollection, rootNode);

        var clsBuilder = new StringBuilder();

        clsBuilder.AppendLine("[XmlRoot(\"" + rootNode.Name + "\")]");

        foreach (var cls in xmlClassCollection)
        {
            clsBuilder.AppendLine("public class " + cls.Key);
            clsBuilder.AppendLine("{");

            foreach (var element in cls.Value.Elements)
            {
                if (XMLType.Element == element.XmlType)
                    clsBuilder.AppendLine("[XmlElement(\"" + element.Name + "\")]");
                else
                    clsBuilder.AppendLine("[XmlAttribute(\"" + element.Name + "\")]");
                clsBuilder.AppendLine("public " + element.Type + element.Name + "{get;set;}");
            }

            clsBuilder.AppendLine("}");
        }

        return clsBuilder.ToString();
    }

    private static void CollectAttributes(ref XMLClass xmlClass, XmlNode node)
    {
        if (null != node.Attributes)
        {
            foreach (XmlAttribute attr in node.Attributes)
            {
                if (null == xmlClass.Elements.SingleOrDefault(o => o.Name == attr.Name))
                    xmlClass.Elements.Add(new Element("string ", attr.Name, XMLType.Attribute));
            }
        }
    }

    private static bool IsEndElement(XmlNode node)
    {
        if ((null == node.Attributes || node.Attributes.Count <= 0) &&
                   (null == node.ChildNodes || !node.HasChildNodes || (node.ChildNodes.Count == 1 && node.ChildNodes[0].NodeType == XmlNodeType.Text)))
        {
            return true;
        }
        return false;
    }

    private static void CollectElements(ref XMLClass xmlClass, XmlNode node)
    {
        foreach (XmlNode childNode in node.ChildNodes)
        {
            if (null == xmlClass.Elements.SingleOrDefault(o => o.Name == childNode.Name))
            {
                var occurance = node.ChildNodes.Cast<XmlNode>().Where(o => o.Name == childNode.Name).Count();
                var appender = "  ";
                if (occurance > 1)
                    appender = "[] ";

               if(IsEndElement(childNode))
                {
                    xmlClass.Elements.Add(new Element("string" + appender, childNode.Name, XMLType.Element));
                }
                else
                {
                    xmlClass.Elements.Add(new Element(childNode.Name + appender, childNode.Name, XMLType.Element));
                }
            }
        }
    }

    private static void CollectChildClass(ref Dictionary<string, XMLClass> xmlClsCollection, XmlNode node)
    {
        foreach (XmlNode childNode in node.ChildNodes)
        {
            if (!IsEndElement(childNode))
            {
                XMLClass xmlClass;
                if (xmlClsCollection.ContainsKey(childNode.Name))
                    xmlClass = xmlClsCollection[childNode.Name];
                else
                {
                    xmlClass = new XMLClass();
                    xmlClsCollection.Add(childNode.Name, xmlClass);
                }
                CollectAttributes(ref xmlClass, childNode);
                CollectElements(ref xmlClass, childNode);
                CollectChildClass(ref xmlClsCollection, childNode);
            }
        }
    }

    private class XMLClass
    {
        public XMLClass()
        {
            Elements = new List<Element>();
        }
        public List<Element> Elements { get; set; }
    }

    private class Element
    {
        public Element(string type, string name, XMLType xmltype)
        {
            Type = type;
            Name = name;
            XmlType = xmltype;
        }
        public XMLType XmlType { get; set; }
        public string Name { get; set; }
        public string Type { get; set; }
    }
  }
}

thanks,

Esen