VB.NET problem converting DataTable to JSON - vb.net

Ok so I'm trying to use the JavaScriptSerializer to work with this code. However it crashes when it reaches the last line;
Dim json As New String(sr.Serialize(dt))
I get this error message;
A circular reference was detected
while serializing an object of type
'System.Reflection.Module'.
I would really appreciate any insights that could help solve this problem.

Circular reference means that serialising the object would result in an infinite loop.
For example if you would try to serialize object "A" having a 1 to 1 reference to object "B".
Declare a class containg the data you want to serialize with JSON to solve this issue.

As hkda150 has already said, you could use a class specifically tailored for being serialized.
This will furthermore enable you to have foreign key values serialized instead of having related full objects serialized. Thus, if you are serializing object a which has a property a.SomeB of type B, then you will often want the ID of a.someB to be present in your webpage. Obviously I don't know enough to be able to say if this is relevant in your specific use case.
BTW, If you find yourself doing a lot of mapping between "business objects" and "objects meant for serialization" you may want to consider using AutoMapper.

Related

ABAP Objects - access message class of a class?

In the header information of an ABAP Objects class, I can enter a message class to use with the MESSAGE statement. This works like the MESSAGE-ID statement of a report or a function pool. Since I can't find the message class I entered in the header data anywhere in the generated sections, I assume that it's generated into the top-level CLASS-POOL statement somewhere.
For some libraries (for examples, the BAL application logging), it's necessary to specify the message class using a variable or a method parameter. Up to now, I've defined a constant that specified the message class and used that constant. I'm wondering if it's possible to access the message class specified in the header data in some other way so that I can get rid of that redundant variable.
Has anyone found a way to do so?
EDIT: The new way should be easier than the old one - I'm not crazy enough to add a CLASS-CONSTRUCTOR and perform some database access or SEO_* function calls just to get rid of that constant.
I think you need a CLASS-CONSTRUCTOR to set a class attribute with the message class.
The MESSAGE statement with INTO clause has the side effect of setting the SY- system variables. So you could put into your CLASS-CONSTRUCTOR something like:
DATA: lf_dummy TYPE string.
MESSAGE s999 INTO lf_dummy.
af_msgid = sy-msgid.
You could use the class builder API:
data the_class type ref to cl_oo_class.
create object the_class
exporting
clsname = `ZCL_SOMECLASS`.
data message_class type arbgb.
message_class = the_class->class-msg_id.
I haven't come across any syntax to do what you ask. For the reasons I outline below, I could believe that SAP never saw a need to include such functionality.
In my experience, the message class is an attribute of the message, not of the object that raises it, so it should be kept together with the type, number, and variables of the message. For example if my object is returning the number of an error, it should be returning the id (class) as well.
In this light I cannot see a reason why you would ever need to know the message-class assigned to an ABAP-OO class, you would only ever need to know the message-class of the messages returned by the ABAP-OO class.
The way I usually manage this is to raise my messages into a dummy field, and then use a subroutine to populate the contents of the sy-msg* fields into a BAPIRETURN structure. Then I return this BAPIRETURN structure to the caller. This way the type, id, number, and variables of the message are all kept together.

Automatically update Entity instance from class MVC 3

I've got a class that closely resembles one of my entities (I use the class for JSON de/serialization because the entity fails conversion to JSON, one of the known gotchyas of JSON + MVC).
Once I deserilize a JSON string into my object, is there a way to automatically update the associated Entity model instance. The property names are the same.
e.g.
'myDeserialized is the deserialized JSON object coming over the wire
Dim entityInstance As DLL.Person = db.getPersonById(myDeserialized.id)
myDeserialized.update(entityInstance)
Where this just goes through and takes all the properties in myDeserialized and updates the same named property in entityInstance?
Or is it possible to just iterate over a key-value pair of all the properties in an object/entity?
I'm looking for something like TryUpdateModel(), but that only works with forms, right? I don't want to tie my data to a form, that's all.
Thanks!
I don't know what type and version of EF you use, but there are very powerful functions for iterating on the entities properties. Which mean you can easily make your update function on the entity or its baseclass' partial (entityInstance.Update(myDesrialized)).
If you use EntityObject, then you can get an ObjectStateEntry for your entities and via this class you can very easily achieve this.
Please let us know what version and type of EF you use (POCO?)

A function that will convert input string to the actual object

I am unsure how to describe what I am looking for, so hopefully the situation will make it somewhat clear.
I have an object with a number of properties (let's say object.one, object.two, object.three). There are about 30 of these properties and they all hold a string ("Pass" or "Fail").
Right now the existing code checks whether the property has value "Pass" or "Fail" and then runs some code that prints stuff out. That is, the same snippet of code is duplicated 30 times, one for each of these properties.
The code looks something like this
If (object.one = ... )
...
End if
If (object.two = ... )
...
End if
If (object.three = ... )
...
End if
I want to use a loop to clean this mess up (each block is huge), but am not sure how to do it. I was thinking perhaps there was a way such that I might be able to construct a string like "object.one" and run some function that will tell the compiler that this is actually an object's property?
That way I could create an array containing the object's name like my array = {"object.one", "object.two", "object.three"} and then do something like, in pseudocode
For each string in my array
If (some_function(string) = ...)
...
End If
Essentially, it would take those massive blocks of duplicated code and reduce it to just one block. Is there such a some_function that I am looking for?
This is in VB.net.
I'm not sure i've understand but you can use reflection and get object properties runtime ?
With reflection you can access public object properties, use PropertyFiled.GetValue() to get one, two, etc. and build an array (i suppose that one, two, etc are object Properties, true?)
Here you can find more information: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.reflection.aspx
Sorry for my bad english, i'm italian.
You seem to be describing serialization, which is the act of converting object state to a format that can be stored/transmitted and deserialization, which is the opposite.
The .NET framework has several different serializers that can work with text - either XML or JSON - the DataContractSerializer for XML and the DataContractJsonSerizlizer for JSON amongst them.

Error using WCF and DataContractSerializer

I have a fairly complex object model that I'm trying to serialize using WCF. I'm running into a problem where I can create a new instance on the server and return it to the client, then trying to pass that same object back or even serialize it using the DataContractSerializer throws an exception.
Test method Server.Service.Test.SerializationTest.TestFilingSerialization threw exception: System.Runtime.Serialization.SerializationException: There was an error deserializing the object of type MyNameSpace.MyObject. No set method for property '' in type ''
It's not giving me any info on a setter I'm supposedly missing, even though I've tried looking through the inheritance hierarchy for missing setters, I can't seem to get passed this. MyObject is a type of property on the object I'm trying to serialize, here's the funny part. In the setter for that property, I have code that looks like this:
set
{
_backingField = value;
_backingField.IsDirtyManager.SetIsDirty();
NotifyPropertyChanged("MyProperty");
if (!ContainsType(_backingField.GetType()))
{
Aggregates.Add(_backingField);
}
}
If I comment out the Aggregates.Add it goes onto the next property and throws the same exception there, the kicker is, it get's through other properties with the same code, before it hits this one and dies, so I don't know what the problem could be.
Anyone have experience where the real error is, because the Property name and Type are not filled out in the exception so it seems like the error has to be something else. If I just create a new instance on the client I can deserialize and serialize no problems, so there's gotta be something I'm missing here. Any ideas on what to look for?
EDIT
I am literally doing only this:
Create instance
Serialize
De-serialize
Re-serialize
Die here
I am assuming that the "Aggregates" is a list in your class.
If your class constructor does not create an Aggregates list, then it is null when you try to add items to it.
This does not match the error you are getting, but worth checking.
EDIT
In Visual Studio go into "Tools" -> "Options" -> "Debugging" -> "General" uncheck the option "Enable Just My Code". Then run it again, you may get a better error message.
Ok, figured it out. The last developer had set the Order property on the DataMember attribute. It was the property with the order before the property in the error message that was causing the problems. There were a couple read-only properties that I missed in that class.
You might see this if your setter is protected or private. If it's not marked public the serializer will not be able to set it. How do you have your Aggregates collection exposed?

vb.net object persisted in database

How can I go about storing a vb.net user defined object in a sql database. I am not trying to replicate the properties with columns. I mean something along the lines of converting or encoding my object to a byte array and then storing that in a field in the db. Like when you store an instance of an object in session, but I need the info to persist past the current session.
#Orion Edwards
It's not a matter of stances. It's because one day, you will change your code. Then you will try de-serialize the old object, and YOUR PROGRAM WILL CRASH.
My Program will not "CRASH", it will throw an exception. Lucky for me .net has a whole set of classes dedicated for such an occasion. At which time I will refresh my stale data and put it back in the db. That is the point of this one field (or stance, as the case may be).
You can use serialization - it allows you to store your object at least in 3 forms: binary (suitable for BLOBs), XML (take advantage of MSSQL's XML data type) or just plain text (store in varchar or text column)
Before you head down this road towards your own eventual insanity, you should take a look at this (or one day repeat it):
http://thedailywtf.com/Articles/The-Mythical-Business-Layer.aspx
Persisting objects in a database is not a good idea. It kills all the good things that a database is designed to do.
You could use the BinaryFormatter class to serialize your object to a binary format, then save the resulting string in your database.
The XmlSerializer or the DataContractSerializer in .net 3.x will do the job for you.
#aku, lomaxx and bdukes - your solutions are what I was looking for.
#1800 INFORMATION - while i appreciate your stance on the matter, this is a special case of data that I get from a webservice that gets refreshed only about once a month. I dont need the data persisted in db form because thats what the webservice is for. Below is the code I finally got to work.
Serialize
#'res is my object to serialize
Dim xml_serializer As System.Xml.Serialization.XmlSerializer
Dim string_writer As New System.IO.StringWriter()
xml_serializer = New System.Xml.Serialization.XmlSerializer(res.GetType)
xml_serializer.Serialize(string_writer, res)
Deserialize
#'string_writer and xml_serializer from above
Dim serialization As String = string_writer.ToString
Dim string_reader As System.IO.StringReader
string_reader = New System.IO.StringReader(serialization)
Dim res2 As testsedie.EligibilityResponse
res2 = xml_serializer.Deserialize(string_reader)
What you want to do is called "Serializing" your object, and .Net has a few different ways to go about it. One is the XmlSerializer class in the System.Xml.Serialization namespace.
Another is in the System.Runtime.Serialization namespace. This has support for a SOAP formatter, a binary formatter, and a base class you can inherit from that all implement a common interface.
For what you are talking about, the BinaryFormatter suggested earlier will probably have the best performance.
I'm backing #1800 Information on this one.
Serializing objects for long-term storage is never a good idea
while i appreciate your stance on the matter, this is a special case of data that I get from a webservice that gets refreshed only about once a month.
It's not a matter of stances. It's because one day, you will change your code. Then you will try de-serialize the old object, and YOUR PROGRAM WILL CRASH.
If it crashes (or throws an exception) all you are left with is a bunch of binary data to try and sift through to recreate your objects.
If you are only persisting binary why not just save straight to disk. You also might want to look at using something like xml as, as has been mentioned, if you alter your object definition you may not be able to unserialise it without some hard work.