How to ignore a property in class if null, using j

Question

I am using Json.NET to serialize a class to JSON.

I have the class like this:

class Test1
{
    [JsonProperty("id")]
    public string ID { get; set; }
    [JsonProperty("label")]
    public string Label { get; set; }
    [JsonProperty("url")]
    public string URL { get; set; }
    [JsonProperty("item")]
    public List<Test2> Test2List { get; set; }
}

I want to add a JsonIgnore() attribute to Test2List property only when Test2List is null. If it is not null then I want to include it in my json.

Answer 1

var settings = new JsonSerializerSettings();
settings.ContractResolver = new CamelCasePropertyNamesContractResolver();
settings.NullValueHandling = NullValueHandling.Ignore;
//you can add multiple settings and then use it
var bodyAsJson = JsonConvert.SerializeObject(body, Formatting.Indented, settings);

Answer 2

To expound slightly on GlennG's very helpful answer (translating the syntax from C# to VB.Net is not always "obvious") you can also decorate individual class properties to manage how null values are handled. If you do this don't use the global JsonSerializerSettings from GlennG's suggestion, otherwise it will override the individual decorations. This comes in handy if you want a null item to appear in the JSON so the consumer doesn't have to do any special handling. If, for example, the consumer needs to know an array of optional items is normally available, but is currently empty... The decoration in the property declaration looks like this:

<JsonPropertyAttribute("MyProperty", DefaultValueHandling:=NullValueHandling.Include)> Public Property MyProperty As New List(of String)

For those properties you don't want to have appear at all in the JSON change :=NullValueHandling.Include to :=NullValueHandling.Ignore. By the way - I've found that you can decorate a property for both XML and JSON serialization just fine (just put them right next to each other). This gives me the option to call the XML serializer in dotnet or the NewtonSoft serializer at will - both work side-by-side and my customers have the option to work with XML or JSON. This is slick as snot on a doorknob since I have customers that require both!

Answer 3

You can do this to ignore all nulls in an object you're serializing, and any null properties won't then appear in the JSON

JsonSerializerSettings settings = new JsonSerializerSettings();
settings.NullValueHandling = NullValueHandling.Ignore;
var myJson = JsonConvert.SerializeObject(myObject, settings);

Answer 4

Here's an option that's similar, but provides another choice:

public class DefaultJsonSerializer : JsonSerializerSettings
{
    public DefaultJsonSerializer()
    {
        NullValueHandling = NullValueHandling.Ignore;
    }
}

Then, I use it like this:

JsonConvert.SerializeObject(postObj, new DefaultJsonSerializer());

The difference here is that:

• Reduces repeated code by instantiating and configuring JsonSerializerSettings each place it's used.
• Saves time in configuring every property of every object to be serialized.
• Still gives other developers flexibility in serialization options, rather than having the property explicitly specified on a reusable object.
• My use-case is that the code is a 3rd party library and I don't want to force serialization options on developers who would want to reuse my classes.
• Potential drawbacks are that it's another object that other developers would need to know about, or if your application is small and this approach wouldn't matter for a single serialization.