Saving a Dictionary<int, object> in C# - Serialization?

Question

I have a dictionary in c#

private Dictionary<int, UserSessionInfo> userSessionLookupTable = new Dictionary<int, UserSessionInfo>();

Now I have created a dictionary object

this.userSessionLookupTable.Add(userSessionInfoLogin.SessionId, userSessionInfoLogin);

Now I want a generic method to serialize and de-serialize the dictionory to byte array. Like

public static void Serialize(Dictionary<int, object> dictionary, Stream stream)
{
 //Code here
}

and

public static static Dictionary<int, object> Deserialize(Stream stream)
{
 //Code here
}

Can anyone help me on this??

Answer 1

Try this....

public static void Serialize<Object>(Object dictionary, Stream stream)
{
    try // try to serialize the collection to a file
    {
        using (stream)
        {
            // create BinaryFormatter
            BinaryFormatter bin = new BinaryFormatter();
            // serialize the collection (EmployeeList1) to file (stream)
            bin.Serialize(stream, dictionary);
        }
    }
    catch (IOException) { ... }
}

public static Object Deserialize<Object>(Stream stream) where Object : new()
{
    Object ret = CreateInstance<Object>();
    try
    {
        using (stream)
        {
            // create BinaryFormatter
            BinaryFormatter bin = new BinaryFormatter();
            // deserialize the collection (Employee) from file (stream)
            ret = (Object)bin.Deserialize(stream);
        }
    }
    catch (IOException) { ... }
    return ret;
}

// function to create instance of T
public static Object CreateInstance<Object>() where Object : new()
{
    return (Object)Activator.CreateInstance(typeof(Object));
}

Usage...

Serialize(userSessionLookupTable, File.Open("data.bin", FileMode.Create));
Dictionary<int, UserSessionInfo> deserializeObject = Deserialize<Dictionary<int, UserSessionInfo>>(File.Open("data.bin", FileMode.Open));

I have used 'Object' in the code above to fulfil your requirements but personally I would use 'T' which usually denotes a generic object in C#