Why are System.Windows.Forms.Control not marked as serializable?

Question

I am not able to deep copy UserControls because they are not marked as serializable.

What is the reason behind this design?

Answer 1

You can serialize Controls but not via standard serializers. If you'd like serialize one or more control on a form to save the form design and/or other control properties you can use the same serialization used by visual studio (via CodeDomSerializer) but you need to implement several classes (I think at least IDesignerSerializationManager). You can see a sample here

http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;813808

The serialization is in Class SampleDesignerLoader method Flush.

In the same method there is also a serialization in an XML stream that does not use classes used by visual studio.

In the same class there is the deserialization from XML.