Serialization and Deserialization in Java

Serialization is a process of converting an object into a byte stream, and Deserialization is a process of converting the serialized object back into a Java object.

When to use Serialization?

We use Serialization when we need to:

• Write an object to a file and store it on a disk.
• Send data over the network.
• Save an object state on disk, e.g., in the middle of some process, so that we can deserialize it and continue where we left.

Serialization and Deserialization are platform-independent, so we can serialize an object in one platform and deserialize it in other.

For a class to be serializable, it must implement a Serializable interface.

Serialization in Java

Let’s write a User class that implements a Serializable interface.

import java.io.Serializable;

public class User implements Serializable {

  int userId;
  String name;

  public User(int userId, String name) {
    this.userId = userId;
    this.name = name;
  }
}

Now, let’s serialize an object of the User class. We will use the writeObject() method of ObjectOutputStream class to serialize and save the object’s state in the file named user1.txt.

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

public class Test {

  public static void main(String args[]) {

    try {

      User user1 = new User(15, "Ryan");

      //Write the object in a stream
      FileOutputStream outputStream = new FileOutputStream("user1.txt");
      ObjectOutputStream out = new ObjectOutputStream(outputStream);
      out.writeObject(user1);
      out.flush();

      // close the stream
      out.close();
    } catch (Exception e) {
      System.out.println("Writing object to file failed. Message: " + e.getMessage());
    }
  }
}

We have successfully written the object state into a file user1.txt.

Now let’s deserialize it back to the Java object.

Deserialization in Java

Let’s read the User object from a file user1.txt and convert it back to the Java object. We will use the readObject() of ObjectInputStream class.

import java.io.*

public class Test {

  public static void main(String args[]) {

    try {
      //Read the object
      ObjectInputStream inputStream = new ObjectInputStream(new FileInputStream("user1.txt"));
      User user1 = (User) inputStream.readObject();

      System.out.println("User object:");
      System.out.println(user1.userId + " " + user1.name);

      //close the stream
      inputStream.close();
    } catch (Exception e) {
      System.out.println("Reading object from a file failed. Message: " + e.getMessage());
    }
  }
}

I hope this tutorial was helpful to you. You now know how to use serialization and deserialization in Java. And if you are interested in more examples, then have a look at how to serialize and deserialize Array in Java.

Happy coding!