Serialization is the process of converting complex objects into a format that can be stored or transmitted. Deserialization is the reverse process of converting the serialized data back into objects. In C++, we can use serialization to store collections of objects with variable sizes, making it easier to persist and transport data.

Serializing Objects

To serialize a collection of objects with variable sizes, we need to define a serialization method for each object. The serialization method should convert the object’s data into a serialized format, such as a binary or text representation.

Let’s take an example of a Person class with name and age attributes. To serialize the Person objects, we can define a serialization method as follows:

class Person {
public:
    std::string name;
    int age;

    // Serialize the Person object to a string
    std::string serialize() const {
        std::ostringstream oss;
        oss << name << "," << age;
        return oss.str();
    }
};

In the serialize() method, we use an ostringstream to convert the name and age into a string format, separated by a comma.

Serializing Collections

Now that we have the serialization method for individual objects, we can proceed to serialize collections of objects.

Let’s say we have a vector of Person objects:

std::vector<Person> people = { {"Alice", 25}, {"Bob", 30}, {"Charlie", 35} };

To serialize this vector, we can loop over each object and call the serialize() method. We can then store the serialized strings in another container, such as a vector or a file.

std::vector<std::string> serializedPeople;

for (const auto& person : people) {
    serializedPeople.push_back(person.serialize());
}

The serializedPeople vector now contains the serialized strings of each Person object.

Deserializing Objects

Deserialization is the process of converting the serialized data back into objects. To deserialize the serialized strings of Person objects, we need to define a deserialization method.

// Deserialize a string into a Person object
Person deserialize(const std::string& serializedString) {
    std::istringstream iss(serializedString);
    std::string name;
    int age;

    std::getline(iss, name, ',');
    iss >> age;

    return { name, age };
}

In the deserialize() method, we use an istringstream to split the serialized string into name and age parts. By using getline() with the ‘,’ delimiter, we can extract the name, and then use >> to extract the age.

Deserializing Collections

To deserialize a collection of serialized objects, we can iterate over the serialized strings and apply the deserialize() method to each string.

std::vector<Person> deserializedPeople;

for (const auto& serializedPerson : serializedPeople) {
    deserializedPeople.push_back(deserialize(serializedPerson));
}

Now, the deserializedPeople vector contains the Person objects that were deserialized from the serialized strings.

Conclusion

Serializing and deserializing collections of C++ objects with variable sizes allows us to store and transmit complex data structures. By defining serialization and deserialization methods for individual objects, we can convert them into a format that can be easily stored or transported. This enables us to effectively manage data in C++ applications. #CPlusPlus #Serialization