How to configure JSON.net deserializer to track missing properties?

Question

Sample class:

public class ClassA
{
    public int Id { get; set; }
    public string SomeString { get; set; }
    public int? SomeInt { get; set; }
}
         


        

Answer 1

Another way to find null/undefined tokens during De-serialization is to write a custom JsonConverter , Here is an example of custom converter which can report both omitted tokens (e.g. "{ 'Id':5 }") and null tokens (e.g {"Id":5,"SomeString":null,"SomeInt":null})

public class NullReportConverter : JsonConverter
{
    private readonly List _nullproperties=new List();
    public bool ReportDefinedNullTokens { get; set; }

    public IEnumerable NullProperties
    {
        get { return _nullproperties; }
    }

    public void Clear()
    {
        _nullproperties.Clear();
    }

    public override bool CanConvert(Type objectType)
    {
        return true;
    }

    public override object ReadJson(JsonReader reader, Type objectType, object existingValue, JsonSerializer serializer)
    {
        existingValue = existingValue ?? Activator.CreateInstance(objectType, true);

        var jObject = JObject.Load(reader);
        var properties =
            objectType.GetProperties(BindingFlags.Instance | BindingFlags.Public | BindingFlags.NonPublic);

        foreach (var property in properties)
        {
            var jToken = jObject[property.Name];
            if (jToken == null)
            {
                _nullproperties.Add(property);
                continue;
            }

            var value = jToken.ToObject(property.PropertyType);
            if(ReportDefinedNullTokens && value ==null)
                _nullproperties.Add(property);

            property.SetValue(existingValue, value, null);
        }

        return existingValue;
    }

    //NOTE: we can omit writer part if we only want to use the converter for deserializing
    public override void WriteJson(JsonWriter writer, object value, JsonSerializer serializer)
    {
        var objectType = value.GetType();
        var properties =
            objectType.GetProperties(BindingFlags.Instance | BindingFlags.Public | BindingFlags.NonPublic);

        writer.WriteStartObject();
        foreach (var property in properties)
        {
            var propertyValue = property.GetValue(value, null);
            writer.WritePropertyName(property.Name);
            serializer.Serialize(writer, propertyValue);
        }

        writer.WriteEndObject();
    }
}

Note: we can omit the Writer part if we don't need to use it for serializing objects.

Usage Example:

class Foo
{
    public int Id { get; set; }
    public string SomeString { get; set; }
    public int? SomeInt { get; set; }
}

class Program
{
    static void Main(string[] args)
    {
        var nullConverter=new NullReportConverter();

        Console.WriteLine("Pass 1");
        var obj0 = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject("{\"Id\":5, \"Id\":5}", nullConverter);
        foreach(var p in nullConverter.NullProperties)
            Console.WriteLine(p);

        nullConverter.Clear();

        Console.WriteLine("Pass2");
        var obj1 = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject("{\"Id\":5,\"SomeString\":null,\"SomeInt\":null}" , nullConverter);
        foreach (var p in nullConverter.NullProperties)
            Console.WriteLine(p);

        nullConverter.Clear();

        nullConverter.ReportDefinedNullTokens = true;
        Console.WriteLine("Pass3");
        var obj2 = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject("{\"Id\":5,\"SomeString\":null,\"SomeInt\":null}", nullConverter);
        foreach (var p in nullConverter.NullProperties)
            Console.WriteLine(p);
    }
}