Provides base functionality for the common language runtime serialization formatters.

The Formatter type is not CLS-compliant. For more information about CLS compliance, see What is the Common Language Specification.

For a list of all members of this type, see Formatter Members.

System.Object
   System.Runtime.Serialization.Formatter

[Visual Basic]
<CLSCompliant(False)>
<Serializable>
MustInherit Public Class Formatter
   Implements IFormatter
[C#]
[CLSCompliant(false)]
[Serializable]
public abstract class Formatter : IFormatter
[C++]
[CLSCompliant(false)]
[Serializable]
public __gc __abstract class Formatter : public IFormatter
[JScript]
public
   CLSCompliant(false)
   Serializable
abstract class Formatter implements IFormatter

Thread Safety

Any public static (Shared in Visual Basic) members of this type are safe for multithreaded operations. Any instance members are not guaranteed to be thread safe.

Remarks

Formatter is the abstract (MustInherit in Visual Basic) base class for all runtime serialization formatters, and provides some helper methods for implementing the IFormatter interface. The Formatter also manages queuing objects for serialization and generating IDs on a per-object basis.

Notes to Inheritors:  When you inherit from Formatter, you must override the following members: Serialize, Deserialize, WriteArray, WriteBoolean, WriteByte, WriteChar, WriteDateTime, WriteDecimal, WriteDouble, WriteInt16, WriteInt32, WriteInt64, WriteObjectRef, WriteSByte, WriteSingle, WriteTimeSpan, WriteUInt16, WriteUInt32, WriteUInt64, WriteValueType, SurrogateSelector, Binder, and Context.

Requirements

Namespace: System.Runtime.Serialization

Platforms: Windows 98, Windows NT 4.0, Windows Millennium Edition, Windows 2000, Windows XP Home Edition, Windows XP Professional, Windows Server 2003 family

Assembly: Mscorlib (in Mscorlib.dll)

See Also

Formatter Members | System.Runtime.Serialization Namespace | ObjectIDGenerator | XML and SOAP Serialization