Generally accepted way to avoid KnownType attribute for every derived class

Question

Is there a generally accepted way to avoid having to use KnownType attributes on WCF services? I\'ve been doing some research, and it looks like there are two options:

Answer 1

The method mentioned by Bob will work as long as all involved classes are in the same assembly.

The following method will work across assemblies:

[DataContract]
[KnownType("GetDerivedTypes")]
public class BaseClass
{
  public static List DerivedTypes = new List();

  private static IEnumerable GetDerivedTypes()
  {
    return DerivedTypes;
  }
}


[DataContract]
public class DerivedClass : BaseClass
{
  //static constructor
  static DerivedClass()
  {
    BaseClass.DerivedTypes.Add(typeof(DerivedClass)); 
  }
}