Serialization and Deserialization

Hi there! I’ve read https://codegym.cc/groups/posts/112-serialization-and-deserialization-in-java and in the below example (copy & paste from the page) I don’t understand why it fails. To me TerritoryInfo, ResourceInfo and DiplomacyInfo classes are built with the same structure so I don’t see we DiplomacyInfo cannot be Serializated. Thanks

public class TerritoryInfo {

   private String info;

   public TerritoryInfo(String info) {
       this.info = info;
   }

   public String getInfo() {
       return info;
   }

   public void setInfo(String info) {
       this.info = info;
   }

   @Override
   public String toString() {
       return "TerritoryInfo{" +
               "info='" + info + '\'' +
               '}';
   }
}

public class ResourceInfo {

   private String info;

   public ResourceInfo(String info) {
       this.info = info;
   }

   public String getInfo() {
       return info;
   }

   public void setInfo(String info) {
       this.info = info;
   }

   @Override
   public String toString() {
       return "ResourceInfo{" +
               "info='" + info + '\'' +
               '}';
   }
}

public class DiplomacyInfo {

   private String info;

   public DiplomacyInfo(String info) {
       this.info = info;
   }

   public String getInfo() {
       return info;
   }

   public void setInfo(String info) {
       this.info = info;
   }

   @Override
   public String toString() {
       return "DiplomacyInfo{" +
               "info='" + info + '\'' +
               '}';
   }
}

And now we face a question: Must all of these classes be Serializable if we want to serialize our SavedGame class?

import java.io.Serializable;
import java.util.Arrays;

public class SavedGame implements Serializable {

   private TerritoryInfo territoryInfo;
   private ResourceInfo resourceInfo;
   private DiplomacyInfo diplomacyInfo;

   public SavedGame(TerritoryInfo territoryInfo, ResourceInfo resourceInfo, DiplomacyInfo diplomacyInfo) {
       this.territoryInfo = territoryInfo;
       this.resourceInfo = resourceInfo;
       this.diplomacyInfo = diplomacyInfo;
   }

   public TerritoryInfo getTerritoryInfo() {
       return territoryInfo;
   }

   public void setTerritoryInfo(TerritoryInfo territoryInfo) {
       this.territoryInfo = territoryInfo;
   }

   public ResourceInfo getResourceInfo() {
       return resourceInfo;
   }

   public void setResourceInfo(ResourceInfo resourceInfo) {
       this.resourceInfo = resourceInfo;
   }

   public DiplomacyInfo getDiplomacyInfo() {
       return diplomacyInfo;
   }

   public void setDiplomacyInfo(DiplomacyInfo diplomacyInfo) {
       this.diplomacyInfo = diplomacyInfo;
   }

   @Override
   public String toString() {
       return "SavedGame{" +
               "territoryInfo=" + territoryInfo +
               ", resourceInfo=" + resourceInfo +
               ", diplomacyInfo=" + diplomacyInfo +
               '}';
   }
}

Alright, then! Let's test it! For now, we'll leave everything as it is and try to serialize a SavedGame object:

import java.io.FileOutputStream;
import java.io.IOException;
import java.io.ObjectOutputStream;

public class Main {

   public static void main(String[] args) throws IOException {

       // Create our object
       TerritoryInfo territoryInfo = new TerritoryInfo("Spain has 6 provinces, Russia has 10 provinces, France has 8 provinces");
       ResourceInfo resourceInfo = new ResourceInfo("Spain has 100 gold, Russia has 80 gold, France has 90 gold");
       DiplomacyInfo diplomacyInfo =  new DiplomacyInfo("France is at war with Russia, Spain has taken a neutral position");


       SavedGame savedGame = new SavedGame(territoryInfo, resourceInfo, diplomacyInfo);

       FileOutputStream fileOutputStream = new FileOutputStream("C:\\Users\\Username\\Desktop\\save.ser");
       ObjectOutputStream objectOutputStream = new ObjectOutputStream(fileOutputStream);

       objectOutputStream.writeObject(savedGame);

       objectOutputStream.close();
   }
}

Result: Exception in thread "main" java.io.NotSerializableException: DiplomacyInfo It didn't work! So, here's the answer to our question. When an object is serialized, all the objects referenced by its instance variables are serialized. And if those objects also reference other objects, then they are also serialized. And on and on forever. All the classes in this chain must be Serializable, otherwise it will be impossible to serialize them and an exception will be thrown.