C# Serializing an object into XML that includes a list of objects

I need to serialize an XML to attach for an API PUT request.

I am using System.Xml.Serialization.

The end result needs to resemble the following:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<prestashop xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">
        <product>
            <id>
                <![CDATA[2678]]>
            </id>
            <cache_default_attribute>
                <![CDATA[0]]>
            </cache_default_attribute>
            <id_shop_default>
                <![CDATA[1]]>
            </id_shop_default>
            <reference>
                <![CDATA[2678]]>
            </reference>
            <supplier_reference>
                <![CDATA[]]>
            </supplier_reference>
            <location>
                <![CDATA[]]>
            </location>
            <width>
                <![CDATA[0.000000]]>
            </width>
            <height>
                <![CDATA[0.000000]]>
            </height>
            <depth>
                <![CDATA[0.000000]]>
            </depth>
            <weight>
                <![CDATA[0.000000]]>
            </weight>
            <quantity_discount>
                <![CDATA[0]]>
            </quantity_discount>
            <ean13>
                <![CDATA[]]>
            </ean13>
            <isbn>
                <![CDATA[]]>
            </isbn>
            <upc>
                <![CDATA[0]]>
            </upc>
            <mpn>
                <![CDATA[000.018]]>
            </mpn>
            <cache_is_pack>
                <![CDATA[0]]>
            </cache_is_pack>
            <cache_has_attachments>
                <![CDATA[0]]>
            </cache_has_attachments>
            <is_virtual>
                <![CDATA[0]]>
            </is_virtual>
            <state>
                <![CDATA[1]]>
            </state>
            <additional_delivery_times>
                <![CDATA[1]]>
            </additional_delivery_times>
            <delivery_in_stock>
                <language id="1">
                    <![CDATA[]]>
                </language>
                <language id="2">
                    <![CDATA[]]>
                </language>
            </delivery_in_stock>
            <delivery_out_stock>
                <language id="1">
                    <![CDATA[]]>
                </language>
                <language id="2">
                    <![CDATA[]]>
                </language>
            </delivery_out_stock>
            <product_type>
                <![CDATA[combinations]]>
            </product_type>
            <on_sale>
                <![CDATA[0]]>
            </on_sale>
            <online_only>
                <![CDATA[0]]>
            </online_only>
            <date_add>
                <![CDATA[2023-02-16 00:21:12]]>
            </date_add>
            <date_upd>
                <![CDATA[2023-02-22 17:22:23]]>
            </date_upd>
            <name>
                <language id="1">
                    <![CDATA[ETNIES TRI LAM POLO (000.018)]]>
                </language>
                <language id="2">
                    <![CDATA[ETNIES TRI LAM POLO (000.018)]]>
                </language>
            </name>
        </product>
</prestashop>

For this purpose I have a class like this:

[XmlType("product")]
public class Product
{
    public Product()
    {
        id = "";
        active = "1";
        available_for_order= "1";
        indexed= "1";
        visibility = "both";
        delivery_in_stock = new List<PaLanguage>();
        delivery_out_stock = new List<PaLanguage>();
        name = new List<PaLanguage>();
    }

    [XmlElement("id")] public XmlCDataSection C_id { get { return new XmlDocument().CreateCDataSection(id); } set { id = value.Value; } }
    [XmlIgnore] public string id;
    [XmlElement("cache_default_attribute")] public XmlCDataSection C_cache_default_attribute { get { return new XmlDocument().CreateCDataSection(cache_default_attribute); } set {cache_default_attribute = value.Value; } }
    [XmlIgnore] public string cache_default_attribute;
    ...
    [XmlArray("delivery_in_stock")] public List<PaLanguage> delivery_in_stock;
    [XmlArray("delivery_out_stock")] public List<PaLanguage> delivery_out_stock;
    ...

With PaLanguage being:

public class PaLanguage
{
    [XmlElement("language")] public XmlCDataSection C_language { get { return new XmlDocument().CreateCDataSection(language); } set { language = value.Value; } }
    [XmlIgnore] public string language { get; set; }
    [XmlAttribute("id")] public string id;
}

Because this is updating a record I first complete a get request and then match all of its values.
I accomplish this with the following code:

XDocument getResponse = Helper.GetProductReference(get, Helper.GetValueByKey("ShopApi") + "products/");
var gotProduct = getResponse
    .Element("prestashop")
    .Element("products")
    .Elements("product")
    .Where(e => e.Element("reference").Value == mtrl)
    .Single();  

I create a new Product item to attach to my put request but I have trouble serializing its XmlArrays.

The last thing I tried was the following:

foreach (XElement x in gotProduct.Element("delivery_in_stock").Elements("language"))
{
    product.delivery_in_stock.Add(new PrestaLanguage { id = (string)x.Attribute("id"), language = (string)x.Element("language") });
}

Which is completely wrong because it serializes it as:

<product>
<id><![CDATA[2678]]></id>
... xml
<delivery_in_stock>
  <PaLanguage id="1">
    <language><![CDATA[]]></language>
  </PaLanguage>
  <PaLanguage id="2">
    <language><![CDATA[]]></language>
  </PaLanguage>
</delivery_in_stock>

It feels like I've tried everything one can find online and in official documentation and only get further from my intended result with each attempt.

I should note the class actually has dozens more fields and they're all either just a string or another combination of id and a language value.

Any and all help is appreciated.

Seems like the delivery_in_stock and delivery_out_stock elements in the XML can contain multiple language elements with different id attributes. Therefore, you need to modify your foreach loop to handle multiple language elements.

Instead of using Elements("language"), you can use Descendants("language") to get all language elements under delivery_in_stock and delivery_out_stock.

foreach (XElement x in gotProduct.Element("delivery_in_stock").Descendants("language"))
{
product.delivery_in_stock.Add(new PaLanguage { id = (string)x.Attribute("id"), language = (string)x });
}
foreach (XElement x in gotProduct.Element("delivery_out_stock").Descendants("language"))
{
product.delivery_out_stock.Add(new PaLanguage { id = (string)x.Attribute("id"), language = (string)x });
}

Also, in the PaLanguage class, the language property should be of type XmlCDataSection, not string, since it contains CDATA.

public class PaLanguage
{
[XmlText]
public XmlCDataSection language { get; set; }
[XmlAttribute("id")]
public string id { get; set; }
}

Lastly, the product class, you should add [XmlElement] attributes to the properties that don't have them, such as id_shop_default, reference, supplier_reference, etc.

[XmlType("product")]
public class Product
{
public Product()
{
id = "";
active = "1";
available_for_order = "1";
indexed = "1";
visibility = "both";
delivery_in_stock = new List<PaLanguage>();
delivery_out_stock = new List<PaLanguage>();
name = new List<PaLanguage>();
}
[XmlElement("id")]
public XmlCDataSection C_id { get { return new XmlDocument().CreateCDataSection(id); } set { id = value.Value; } }
[XmlElement("cache_default_attribute")]
public XmlCDataSection C_cache_default_attribute { get { return new XmlDocument().CreateCDataSection(cache_default_attribute); } set { cache_default_attribute = value.Value; } }
[XmlElement("id_shop_default")]
public XmlCDataSection C_id_shop_default { get { return new XmlDocument().CreateCDataSection(id_shop_default); } set { id_shop_default = value.Value; } }
[XmlElement("reference")]
public XmlCDataSection C_reference { get { return new XmlDocument().CreateCDataSection(reference); } set { reference = value.Value; } }
[XmlElement("supplier_reference")]
public XmlCDataSection C_supplier_reference { get { return new XmlDocument().CreateCDataSection(supplier_reference); } set { supplier_reference = value.Value; } }
[XmlElement("location")]
public XmlCDataSection C_location { get { return new XmlDocument().CreateCDataSection(location); } set { location = value.Value; } }
[XmlElement("width")]
public XmlCDataSection C_width { get { return new XmlDocument().CreateCDataSection(width); } set { width = value.Value; } }
[XmlElement("height")]
public XmlCDataSection C_height { get { return new XmlDocument().CreateCDataSection(height); } set { height = value.Value; } }
// etc..

what you can do is to replace your current PaLanguage by PaLanguage below, and try to do the same things on all the fields where you found a problem:

[XmlElement(ElementName = "language")]
public class PaLanguage
{
    [XmlText] 
    public string value { get; set; }
    [XmlAttribute("id")] 
    public string id;
}

</details>



# 答案3
**得分**: 0

我先前在代码中的修改是正确的，我将`C_language`更改为`XmlNode[]`，并且具有略有不同的getter和setter。

然后，我还更改了`Product`中的列表。

最后，根据Sebastian的建议，我使用`Descendants`而不是`Elements`。

感谢所有帮助过我的人。

<details>
<summary>英文:</summary>

I was on the right track with 

public class PaLanguage
{
[XmlElement("language")] public XmlCDataSection C_language { get { return new XmlDocument().CreateCDataSection(language); } set { language = value.Value; } }
[XmlIgnore] public string language { get; set; }
[XmlAttribute("id")] public string id;
}

First I changed C_language into an XmlNode[] with a slightly different getter and setter 

public class PaLanguage
{
[XmlText] public XmlNode[] C_language
{
get { var dummy = new XmlDocument(); return new XmlNode[] { dummy.CreateCDataSection(language) }; }
set { var dummy = (XmlCDataSection)value[0]; language = dummy.Data; }
}
[XmlIgnore] public string language { get; set; }
[XmlAttribute("id")] public string id;
}

Then I also changed the lists in Product

[XmlArray("delivery_in_stock")] [XmlArrayItem("language")] public List<PaLanguage> delivery_in_stock;
[XmlArray("delivery_out_stock")] [XmlArrayItem("language")] public List<PaLanguage> delivery_out_stock

Finally as Sebastian recommended, I used Descendants instead of Elements.

foreach (XElement x in gotProduct.Element("delivery_in_stock").Descendants("language"))
{
product.delivery_in_stock.Add(new PrestaLanguage { id = (string)x.Attribute("id"), language = (string)x.Element("language") });
}
foreach (XElement x in gotProduct.Element("delivery_out_stock").Descendants("language"))
{
product.delivery_out_stock.Add(new PrestaLanguage { id = (string)x.Attribute("id"), language = (string)x.Element("language") });
}

Thanks to everyone that helped.
</details>