Question

Advice needed on using ObjectInputStream/OutputStream for (de)serialization processes, how to keep older version readable?

Asked by: inq123

In my software, I have a large class representing a document, which is saved to file using ObjectOutputStream and later read out by ObjectInputStream.  While everything's very convenient, problem arises every time I tried to modify anything in that class, or any class that the class references (of course those objects are saved along with the main document object) --- the new class won't be able to read old document any more and throws an exception about class ID not matching.

While this is expected behavior, it gets really annoying because if I do any upgrades, I would have to provide a way to migrate old files over.  Of course one way is to keep two sets of classes, the old one and convert to new one.  But once there're several versions, this is not going to be workable.

So my question is:

What would be the best way to solve this upgrade problem in my situation?  Namely, Is there anyway to easily read old objects without exception into new objects?  I never used resolveObject() but would it help? how?  Or should I abandon ObjectOutputStream etc. altogether and write my own class?  That would be a big hassle, however, and it has to be the very last resort.

Thanks in advance.

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Asked On
2004-11-22 at 07:54:38ID21215972
Tags

objectinputstream

,

using

Topic

Java Programming Language

Participating Experts
2
Points
500
Comments
7

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Answers

 

by: zzynxPosted on 2004-11-22 at 07:57:44ID: 12645436

 

by: zzynxPosted on 2004-11-22 at 07:59:49ID: 12645464

 

by: TimYatesPosted on 2004-11-22 at 08:10:57ID: 12645596

Or just use the XMLEncoder in java.beans.XMLEncoder

 

by: TimYatesPosted on 2004-11-22 at 08:11:30ID: 12645602

 

by: inq123Posted on 2004-11-22 at 08:53:45ID: 12646096

zzynx, thanks!  Although I havent tried it out but it should be the solution that I need.  Simple and effective.

TimYates, thanks for your answer.  It's interesting but it would involve more work (converting to public members and providing get/setters for all members) and produce a larger file I believe, so I probably won't use it.

 

by: TimYatesPosted on 2004-11-22 at 08:57:07ID: 12646134

Fair enough :-)

Glad to give you a different direction to investigate anyways ;-)

Good luck with it!!

Tim

 

by: zzynxPosted on 2004-11-23 at 00:00:37ID: 12652251

Thanks for accepting

20120131-EE-VQP-002

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