Json string deserialized to array list of objects

Question

Please help! Getting this error on Deserializing:

Cannot convert object of type 'System.String' to type 'System.Collections.Generic.List'

JSON string from client:

"\"[{\\"id\\":\\"18_0_2_0\\",\\"ans\\":\\"You can enter free text in place of *\\"},{\\"id\\":\\"23_1_3_1\\",\\"ans\\":\\"The refresh button\\"},{\\"id\\":\\"11_2_1_2\\",\\"ans\\":\\"False\\"}]\""

Edit: Unescaped (see comments):

[{"id":"18_0_2_0","ans":"You can enter free text in place of *"},{"id":"11_2_1_2","ans":"False"}]

JavaScriptSerializer serializer = new JavaScriptSerializer();
List<RawAnswer> ListAnswers = serializer.Deserialize<List<RawAnswer>>(str);
 [Serializable]
public class RawAnswer
{       
    public string QuestionID { get; set; }
    public string Answer { get; set; }

    public RawAnswer() { }

}

public class AnswerList
{
    public List<RawAnswer> RawAnswer { get; set; }
}

Solution 1

Your original json string(before aKzenT's edit) was double escaped and I used var str2 = Regex.Unescape(str); to get the actual string .

public class RawAnswer
{
     public string id { get; set; }
     public string ans { get; set; }

}

And no need for AnswerList

Now your code can work

JavaScriptSerializer serializer = new JavaScriptSerializer();
List<RawAnswer> ListAnswers = serializer.Deserialize<List<RawAnswer>>(str);

Solution 2

The JSON string you receive from the client is itself a string containing the actual JSON string you're looking for. Either fix the client to send you a correct string, or first deserialize this result into a String, and then deserialize that into a List<RawAnswer>.

Comments

[user1553087]

As you suggested I did this: string strResult = serializer.Deserialize<String>(str); List<RawAnswer> LAsnwers = serializer.Deserialize<List<RawAnswer>>(strResult); I got LAnswers values = null (QuestionID=null and Answer=null)

[user1553087]

It Works! THANK YOU so much! Basically the properties of my object must be the same of the fields in the json string.