Easy way to convert a Dictionary to xml and vice versa

Question

Wondering if there is a fast way, maybe with linq?, to convert a Dictionary into a XML document. And a way to convert the xml back to a di

Answer 1

Just use this for XML to Dictionary:

     public static Dictionary XmlToDictionary
                                        (string key, string value, XElement baseElm)
        {
            Dictionary dict = new Dictionary();

            foreach (XElement elm in baseElm.Elements())
            { 
                string dictKey = elm.Attribute(key).Value;
                string dictVal = elm.Attribute(value).Value;

                dict.Add(dictKey, dictVal);

            }

            return dict;
        }

Dictionary to XML:

 public static XElement DictToXml
                  (Dictionary inputDict, string elmName, string valuesName)
        {

            XElement outElm = new XElement(elmName);

            Dictionary.KeyCollection keys = inputDict.Keys;

            XElement inner = new XElement(valuesName);

            foreach (string key in keys)
            {
                inner.Add(new XAttribute("key", key));
                inner.Add(new XAttribute("value", inputDict[key]));
            }

            outElm.Add(inner);

            return outElm;
        }

The XML:

You just pass the element UserTypes to that method and voila you get a dictionary with the coresponding keys and values and vice versa. After converting a dictionary append the element to XDocument object and save it on the disk.