DataContract Projection, Part I

Now that Indigo is starting to roll into the hands of more developers, I think I`ll start talking more about it.

The first item I want to discuss is how a DataContract is "projected" into XSD.

This is going to be a multi-part post, as I get bored quickly and I have children. ;-)

Suppose I have the below:

    [DataContract]

    class Person

    {

        [DataMember]

        string Name;

        [DataMember]

        int Age;

    }

Which yields the following XSD (using dc.exe -- included with Indigo):

http://schemas.datacontract.org/2004/07/ConsoleApplication1" 


xmlns:ser="http://schemas.microsoft.com/2003/10/Serialization/" 


elementFormDefault="qualified" 


targetNamespace="http://schemas.datacontract.org/2004/07/ConsoleApplication1" 


xmlns:xs="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema">

  http://schemas.microsoft.com/2003/10/Serialization/"
/>

  

    

      

      

      

        

        

      

    

    

  

  

Note a couple of things about this schema:

1. Age is not a xs:int.
2. Name is not xs:string.
3. Age appears before Name in the outer sequence.
4. There is some wacky nested sequence at the end of the outer sequence.

I`ll talk more about this in the next post, but here is a little hint that will start to explain the above:

    [DataContract]

    class Person

    {

        [DataMember]

        string Name;
 
        [DataMember]

        int Age;
	
	[DataMember(VersionAdded=2, MustUnderstand=true, SerializeAs=SerializationReferenceMode.Value)]
        string Address;

    }