How to convert byte array to any type

by

Primitive types are easy because they have a defined representation as a byte array. Other objects are not because they may contain things that cannot be persisted, like file handles, references to other objects, etc.

You can try persisting an object to a byte array using BinaryFormatter:

public byte[] ToByteArray<T>(T obj)
{
    if(obj == null)
        return null;
    BinaryFormatter bf = new BinaryFormatter();
    using(MemoryStream ms = new MemoryStream())
    {
        bf.Serialize(ms, obj);
        return ms.ToArray();
    }
}

public T FromByteArray<T>(byte[] data)
{
    if(data == null)
         return default(T);
    BinaryFormatter bf = new BinaryFormatter();
    using(MemoryStream ms = new MemoryStream(data))
    {
        object obj = bf.Deserialize(ms);
        return (T)obj;
    }
}

But not all types are serializable. There’s no way to “store” a connection to a database, for example. You can store the information that’s used to create the connection (like the connection string) but you can’t store the actual connection object.

UPDATE

BinaryFormatter is now considered “insecure“, especially when trying to deserialize data from untrusted sources. Which makes sense, since you’re essentially loading raw binary data into memory that could do bad things.

Suggested alternatives are to use a non-binary format like XML or JSON for generic object graphs, or write custom binary serialization code to serialize primitive members explicitly.

More Related Contents:

  1. Byte array to image conversion
  2. C# Append byte array to existing file
  3. Converting 2 bytes to Short in C#
  4. Byte Array to Bitmap Image
  5. Unable to change array size in Inspector variable in Unity?
  6. how to write every element of an array in a line of a textbox C# [closed]
  7. Convert string[] to Array
  8. How do I divide an array into separate arrays in C#?
  9. Check if string is null
  10. Cannot deserialize the JSON array (e.g. [1,2,3]) into type ‘ ‘ because type requires JSON object (e.g. {“name”:”value”}) to deserialize correctly
  11. Array slices in C#
  12. How do I concatenate two arrays in C#?
  13. How do I convert a Stream into a byte[] in C#? [duplicate]
  14. How to store int[] array in application Settings
  15. Fast way to convert a two dimensional array to a List ( one dimensional )
  16. How can I print the contents of an array horizontally?
  17. What is the use of the ArraySegment class?
  18. How to pass a single object[] to a params object[]
  19. How to add a string to a string[] array? There’s no .Add function
  20. C# Cast Entire Array?
  21. Why is there huge performance hit in 2048×2048 versus 2047×2047 array multiplication?
  22. Cannot deserialize the current JSON array (e.g. [1,2,3])
  23. Can’t create huge arrays
  24. How to check if a byte array is a valid image?
  25. Why is array co-variance considered so horrible?
  26. 2d Array from text file c# [closed]
  27. How to get intellisense in Visual Studio Code for Unity functions names?
  28. Is it possible to extend arrays in C#?
  29. Is string actually an array of chars or does it just have an indexer?
  30. Array of an unknown length in C#

Leave a Comment