Serializing object with no namespaces using DataContractSerializer

Question

How do I remove XML namespaces from an object\'s XML representation serialized using DataContractSerializer?

That object needs to be serialized to a very simple outp

Answer 1

If you have your heart set on bypassing the default behavior (as I currently do), you create a custom XmlWriter that bypasses writing the namespace.

using System.IO;
using System.Xml;

public class MyXmlTextWriter : XmlTextWriter
{
  public MyXmlTextWriter(Stream stream)
    : base(stream, null)
  {
  }

  public override void WriteStartElement(string prefix, string localName, string ns)
  {
    base.WriteStartElement(null, localName, "");
  }
}

Then in your writer consumer, something like the following:

var xmlDoc = new XmlDocument();
DataContractSerializer serializer = new DataContractSerializer(obj.GetType());
using (var ms = new MemoryStream())
{
  using (var writer = new MyXmlTextWriter(ms))
  {
    serializer.WriteObject(writer, obj);
    writer.Flush();
    ms.Seek(0L, SeekOrigin.Begin);
    xmlDoc.Load(ms);
  }
}

And the output will have namespace declarations in it, but there will be no usages as such:

<TestObject xmlns:i="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance">
  <Items xmlns:d2p1="http://schemas.microsoft.com/2003/10/Serialization/Arrays">
    <string>Item1</string>
    <string>Item2</string>
  </Items>
</TestObject>

Answer 2

You need to mark the classes you want to serialize with:

[DataContract(Namespace="")]

In that case, the data contract serializer will not use any namespace for your serialized objects.

Marc