How to Serialize and Deserialize a C Class with Members of Custom Data Types?

How to Serialize and Deserialize Class with Members of Custom Data Types in C

Introduction

Serialization involves converting an object's state into a format that can be stored and later reconstructed. When dealing with complex data structures like classes with members of custom data types, serialization becomes particularly relevant.

问题

The primary question is twofold:

1. How to efficiently implement a serialization function that returns serialized data as a vector of bytes?
2. How to design a suitable deserialization function to reconstruct the object from the serialized data?

Response

Solution 1: Implementing the serialize Function

The suggested prototype for the serialize function is:

<code class="cpp">std::vector<uint8_t> serialize(Mango const& Man);</code>

This function accepts a Mango object by reference (Man) and returns a std::vector of bytes that represent the serialized data.

Solution 2: Implementing the deserialize Function

The corresponding deserialize function has the following prototype:

<code class="cpp">Mango deserialize(std::span<uint8_t const> data);</code>

It takes a span of bytes (data) and returns a Mango object constructed from the deserialized data.

Suggested Implementations

Based on the helper functions described below, these suggested implementations offer efficient serialization and deserialization:

<code class="cpp">// Serialization function
std::vector<uint8_t> serialize(Mango const& Man) {
    std::vector<uint8_t> bytes;
    do_generate(back_inserter(bytes), Man);
    return bytes;
}

// Deserialization function
Mango deserialize(std::span<uint8_t const> data) {
    Mango result;
    auto f = begin(data), l = end(data);
    if (!do_parse(f, l, result))
        throw std::runtime_error("deserialize");
    return result;
}</code>

Custom Serialization Helpers

These helper functions (implemented in the my_serialization_helpers namespace) provide the core serialization and parsing functionality:

• Generators (do_generate Functions):

  • Convert primitive data types and containers to byte sequences.

• Parsers (do_parse Functions):

  • Extract data from byte sequences and construct corresponding data structures.

Custom Types Serialization

To serialize custom data types within the Mango class, additional do_generate and do_parse functions are defined for each type:

• ValType, FuntionMango, MangoType, and Mango can be serialized and deserialized using these helpers.

Example Usage

The provided example demonstrates serialization and deserialization of a Mango object, verifying its integrity through round-tripping and debug output.

Portability and Endianness

Endianness is not inherently accounted for in this implementation. To ensure portability across different hardware architectures, an additional step of normalizing endianness may be required. Libraries like Boost Endian can be utilized for this purpose without requiring library linking.

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