SerialFormat

Represents an instance of a serialization format that can interact with KSerializer and is a supertype of all entry points for a serialization. It does not impose any restrictions on a serialized form or underlying storage, neither it exposes them.

Concrete data types and API for user-interaction are responsibility of a concrete subclass or subinterface, for example StringFormat, BinaryFormat or Json.

Typically, formats have their specific Encoder and Decoder implementations as private classes and do not expose them.

Exception types for SerialFormat implementation

Methods responsible for format-specific encoding and decoding are allowed to throw any subtype of IllegalArgumentException in order to indicate serialization and deserialization errors. It is recommended to throw subtypes of SerializationException for encoder and decoder specific errors and IllegalArgumentException for input and output validation-specific errors.

For formats

Not stable for inheritance

SerialFormat interface is not stable for inheritance in 3rd party libraries, as new methods might be added to this interface or contracts of the existing methods can be changed.

It is safe to operate with instances of SerialFormat and call its methods.

Inheritors