How to implement custom JsonConverter in JSON.NET to deserialize a List of base class objects?

Question

I am trying to extend the JSON.net example given here http://james.newtonking.com/projects/json/help/CustomCreationConverter.html

I have another sub class deriving

Answer 1

Using the idea of totem and zlangner, I have created a KnownTypeConverter that will be able to determine the most appropriate inheritor, while taking into account that json data may not have optional elements.

So, the service sends a JSON response that contains an array of documents (incoming and outgoing). Documents have both a common set of elements and different ones. In this case, the elements related to the outgoing documents are optional and may be absent.

In this regard, a base class Document was created that includes a common set of properties. Two inheritor classes are also created: - OutgoingDocument adds two optional elements "device_id" and "msg_id"; - IncomingDocument adds one mandatory element "sender_id";

The task was to create a converter that based on json data and information from KnownTypeAttribute will be able to determine the most appropriate class that allows you to save the largest amount of information received. It should also be taken into account that json data may not have optional elements. To reduce the number of comparisons of json elements and properties of data models, I decided not to take into account the properties of the base class and to correlate with json elements only the properties of the inheritor classes.

Data from the service:

{
    "documents": [
        {
            "document_id": "76b7be75-f4dc-44cd-90d2-0d1959922852",
            "date": "2019-12-10 11:32:49",
            "processed_date": "2019-12-10 11:32:49",
            "sender_id": "9dedee17-e43a-47f1-910e-3a88ff6bc258",
        },
        {
            "document_id": "5044a9ac-0314-4e9a-9e0c-817531120753",
            "date": "2019-12-10 11:32:44",
            "processed_date": "2019-12-10 11:32:44",
        }
    ], 
    "total": 2
}

Data models:

/// 

/// Service response model
/// 
public class DocumentsRequestIdResponse
{
    [JsonProperty("documents")]
    public Document[] Documents { get; set; }

    [JsonProperty("total")]
    public int Total { get; set; }
}

// 

/// Base document
/// 
[JsonConverter(typeof(KnownTypeConverter))]
[KnownType(typeof(OutgoingDocument))]
[KnownType(typeof(IncomingDocument))]
public class Document
{
    [JsonProperty("document_id")]
    public Guid DocumentId { get; set; }

    [JsonProperty("date")]
    public DateTime Date { get; set; }

    [JsonProperty("processed_date")]
    public DateTime ProcessedDate { get; set; } 
}

/// 

/// Outgoing document
/// 
public class OutgoingDocument : Document
{
    // this property is optional and may not be present in the service's json response
    [JsonProperty("device_id")]
    public string DeviceId { get; set; }

    // this property is optional and may not be present in the service's json response
    [JsonProperty("msg_id")]
    public string MsgId { get; set; }
}

/// 

/// Incoming document
/// 
public class IncomingDocument : Document
{
    // this property is mandatory and is always populated by the service
    [JsonProperty("sender_sys_id")]
    public Guid SenderSysId { get; set; }
}

Converter:

public class KnownTypeConverter : JsonConverter
{
    public override bool CanConvert(Type objectType)
    {
        return System.Attribute.GetCustomAttributes(objectType).Any(v => v is KnownTypeAttribute);
    }

    public override bool CanWrite => false;

    public override object ReadJson(JsonReader reader, Type objectType, object existingValue, JsonSerializer serializer)
    {
        // load the object 
        JObject jObject = JObject.Load(reader);

        // take custom attributes on the type
        Attribute[] attrs = Attribute.GetCustomAttributes(objectType);

        Type mostSuitableType = null;
        int countOfMaxMatchingProperties = -1;

        // take the names of elements from json data
        HashSet jObjectKeys = GetKeys(jObject);

        // take the properties of the parent class (in our case, from the Document class, which is specified in DocumentsRequestIdResponse)
        HashSet objectTypeProps = objectType.GetProperties(BindingFlags.Instance | BindingFlags.Public)
            .Select(p => p.Name)
            .ToHashSet();

        // trying to find the right "KnownType"
        foreach (var attr in attrs.OfType())
        {
            Type knownType = attr.Type;
            if(!objectType.IsAssignableFrom(knownType))
                continue;

            // select properties of the inheritor, except properties from the parent class and properties with "ignore" attributes (in our case JsonIgnoreAttribute and XmlIgnoreAttribute)
            var notIgnoreProps = knownType.GetProperties(BindingFlags.Instance | BindingFlags.Public)
                .Where(p => !objectTypeProps.Contains(p.Name)
                            && p.CustomAttributes.All(a => a.AttributeType != typeof(JsonIgnoreAttribute) && a.AttributeType != typeof(System.Xml.Serialization.XmlIgnoreAttribute)));

            //  get serializable property names
            var jsonNameFields = notIgnoreProps.Select(prop =>
            {
                string jsonFieldName = null;
                CustomAttributeData jsonPropertyAttribute = prop.CustomAttributes.FirstOrDefault(a => a.AttributeType == typeof(JsonPropertyAttribute));
                if (jsonPropertyAttribute != null)
                {
                    // take the name of the json element from the attribute constructor
                    CustomAttributeTypedArgument argument = jsonPropertyAttribute.ConstructorArguments.FirstOrDefault();
                    if(argument != null && argument.ArgumentType == typeof(string) && !string.IsNullOrEmpty((string)argument.Value))
                        jsonFieldName = (string)argument.Value;
                }
                // otherwise, take the name of the property
                if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(jsonFieldName))
                {
                    jsonFieldName = prop.Name;
                }

                return jsonFieldName;
            });


            HashSet jKnownTypeKeys = new HashSet(jsonNameFields);

            // by intersecting the sets of names we determine the most suitable inheritor
            int count = jObjectKeys.Intersect(jKnownTypeKeys).Count();

            if (count == jKnownTypeKeys.Count)
            {
                mostSuitableType = knownType;
                break;
            }

            if (count > countOfMaxMatchingProperties)
            {
                countOfMaxMatchingProperties = count;
                mostSuitableType = knownType;
            }
        }

        if (mostSuitableType != null)
        {
            object target = Activator.CreateInstance(mostSuitableType);
            using (JsonReader jObjectReader = CopyReaderForObject(reader, jObject))
            {
                serializer.Populate(jObjectReader, target);
            }
            return target;
        }

        throw new SerializationException($"Could not serialize to KnownTypes and assign to base class {objectType} reference");
    }

    public override void WriteJson(JsonWriter writer, object value, JsonSerializer serializer)
    {
        throw new NotImplementedException();
    }

    private HashSet GetKeys(JObject obj)
    {
        return new HashSet(((IEnumerable>) obj).Select(k => k.Key));
    }

    public static JsonReader CopyReaderForObject(JsonReader reader, JObject jObject)
    {
        JsonReader jObjectReader = jObject.CreateReader();
        jObjectReader.Culture = reader.Culture;
        jObjectReader.DateFormatString = reader.DateFormatString;
        jObjectReader.DateParseHandling = reader.DateParseHandling;
        jObjectReader.DateTimeZoneHandling = reader.DateTimeZoneHandling;
        jObjectReader.FloatParseHandling = reader.FloatParseHandling;
        jObjectReader.MaxDepth = reader.MaxDepth;
        jObjectReader.SupportMultipleContent = reader.SupportMultipleContent;
        return jObjectReader;
    }
}

PS: In my case, if no one inheritor has not been selected by converter (this can happen if the JSON data contains information only from the base class or the JSON data does not contain optional elements from the OutgoingDocument), then an object of the OutgoingDocument class will be created, since it is listed first in the list of KnownTypeAttribute attributes. At your request, you can vary the implementation of the KnownTypeConverter in this situation.