C#.NET - JSON Object Mapper

JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) is one of the most commonly used data passing formats used in Web API(s) development. Parsing & manipulating complex JSON objects becomes quite the headache especially with array parsing technique. JSON objects parsing using C#.NET is on the other hand is quit simple, all you have to do is to create your target JSON object mapper and then deserialize the JSON string/object.

Today, I shall be demonstrating creation of a complex JSON object mapper using C#.NET technology Console Application.

Following are some prerequisites before you proceed any further in this tutorial,

The example code is being developed in Microsoft Visual Studio 2019 Professional.

Let's begin now.

Create a new C#.NET Console Application project and name it "JSONMapper".

Open "Tools\Nuget Package Manage\Manage Nuget Packages for Solution...".

Install Newtonsoft.Json NuGet Package i.e.

I am using the following sample JSON data i.e.

Let's breakdown this sample JSON in order to create out Object mapper.

In the above snippet, 1, 2, 5, & 6 points indicate the start & end of the JSON object and any list object inside. Point 4 indicates names of the object which should be used exactly as they are mentioned that includes case sensitivity as well, these names will be used during the creation of our JSON mapper object. Point 3 indicates start of the object and point 7 indicates value of the object which could be a list, integer value, bool, string etc. Point 8 highlights a single item of the list object which needs to be constructed according to the structure provided in point 8.

So, based on the above understanding of our sample JSON, create list item structure first, by creating a new "Objects\ItemObj.cs" file and replace following code in it i.e.

In the above code, I have created the list item object structure according to my sample JSON, notice that the names of the properties are exactly according to the JSON structure with case sensitivity.

Now, create a menu object class which contains a string object and a list object of type ItemObj that I have created in the previous step, so, create a new "Objects\MenuObj.cs" file and replace following code in it i.e.