Better way to convert strings in json object to ints in c# class

Question

Given the following JSON object

[
  {
    "change_date": "20211118 2134",
    "inspection_id": "74207177",
    "insp_unit_id": "185883333",
  }
]

And the following C# class.

public class Root
{
    public string change_date { get; set; }
    public string inspection_id { get; set; }
    public string insp_unit_id { get; set; }
}

What is a good way to return int's instead of strings. I'm currently adding methods to the class like below.

public int inspection_id_int()
{
    return Convert.toint32(inspection_id );
}

Looking for advice on a better way to achieve this. I'm using System.Text.JSON and deserializing via JsonSerializer.Deserialize.

Answer 1

It depends on what you want to have as int, change_date is not valid number (has space in the middle).

But when it comes to other fields, just decalre them as int

class Root
{
    public string change_date { get; set; }
    public int inspection_id { get; set; }
    public int insp_unit_id { get; set; }
}

and then pass JsonSerializerOptions with NumberHandling = JsonNumberHandling.AllowReadingFromString to Deserialize method:

var json = @"[
  {
    ""change_date"": ""20211118 2134"",
    ""inspection_id"": ""74207177"",
    ""insp_unit_id"": ""185883333""
  }
]";

var root = JsonSerializer.Deserialize<Root[]>(
    json,
    new JsonSerializerOptions
    {
        NumberHandling = JsonNumberHandling.AllowReadingFromString
    });