XStream is a simple library to serialize objects to XML and back again.
Features
- Ease of use. A high level facade is supplied that simplifies common use cases.
- No mappings required. Most objects can be serialized without need for specifying mappings.
- Performance. Speed and low memory footprint are a crucial part of the design, making it suitable for
large object graphs or systems with high message throughput.
- Clean XML. No information is duplicated that can be obtained via reflection. This results
in XML that is easier to read for humans and more compact than native Java serialization.
- Requires no modifications to objects. Serializes internal fields, including private and
final. Supports non-public and inner classes. Classes are not required to have default constructor.
- Full object graph support. Duplicate references encountered in the object-model will
be maintained. Supports circular references.
- Integrates with other XML APIs. By implementing an interface, XStream can serialize
directly to/from any tree structure (not just XML).
- Customizable conversion stategies. Strategies can be registered allowing customization of how
particular types are represented as XML.
- Error messages. When an exception occurs due to malformed XML, detailed diagnostics are provided
to help isolate and fix the problem.
Typical Uses
- Persistence
- Transport
- Configuration
Known Limitations
If using the Sun 1.4 JVM, XStream can reinstantiate classes that do not have a default constructor. However,
if using a different JVM, a default constructor is required.
Getting Started
Jan 13, 2006 XStream 1.1.3 released
- Added XStream.toXML(OutputStream) and XStream.fromXML(InputStream).
- Ability to prevent fields from being serialized by calling XStream.omitField() or by implementing Mapper.shouldSerializeMember().
- Added Converter for Enum, EnumMap and EnumSet
- Added BeanConverter and ISO8601SqlTimestampConverter
- Fixed support for IBM JVM (contributed by Gabor Liptak)
View the complete change log and download.