XmlSerializer in .Net

[amtrac24]

Hey All,

I am just learned how to serialize things in .Net very very easy. Just curious what everyone uses it for. I can see the instance where you have an instance of an object and you want to throw the objects instance in xml into a database.

There any other real world scenario's that anyone uses it for?

Benefits / cons of using it?

[sr71000]

For smaller projects it can be MUCH easier than trying to write your own saving/loading methods. But that's basically what it's for, to save the state of your program so you can pick back up where you left off later!

-Kevin

[amtrac24]

i briefly worked on 1 win form app with a web service...The programmer that coded it sent everything to the web service in xml through serialization then casted it back to the class it should be in...What are the benefits to this? I would assume passing in a string rather then an object would be a little faster...maybe a little less memory overhead.

am i correct? or the programmer learned a new toy and wanted to use it even though it made no sense to use it.

[sr71000]

honestly I couldn't tell ya.. Sorry :-\