Deep clone an object with C# Deep clone an object with C#

Cloning is a common thing I need to do in my C# project. The most common case I use this is with my Entity Framework projects. I first fetch my object using a standard Linq query.

Once I have this object, EF is now tracking any changes to the object. I want a duplicate object of this so I can track a before and after state, so I want to clone the fetched object. To do this I use JSON.Net nuget package.


First be sure you've installed the JSON.Net package. Once installed the following two lines of code will accomplish it:


var serialized = JsonConvert.SerializeObject(original);
var cloned = JsonConvert.DeserializeObject(serialized);

Since I'm a fan of extension methods (as I've demonstrated with converting a date with C#), I've created a class and wrapped this in an extension method:


public static class SystemExtension
{
public static T Clone(this T original)
{
var serialized = JsonConvert.SerializeObject(original);
return JsonConvert.DeserializeObject(serialized);
}
}

I've added this as a SystemExtension which means I can access this extension method on any object by adding .Clone() to it.


var cloned = original.Clone();

Published on Jan 25, 2020

Tags: ASP.NET MVC and Web API Tutorial | c# | clone

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Jamie Munro
Jamie Munro

Jamie Munro is the author of ASP.NET MVC 5 with Bootstrap and Knockout.js, Knockout.js: Building Dynamic Client-Side Web Applications, 20 Recipes for Programming MVC 3, and 20 Recipes for Programming PhoneGap. He has been developing websites and web applications for over 20 years.

Jamie began his writing career in 2009. As the success of Jamie's blog grew, he turned his writing passion to books about web development in hopes that his many years of experience could be passed on to his readers.

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