Applied XML Programming for Microsoft® .NET

Serializing DataSet Objects

Like any other .NET Framework object, a DataSet object is stored in memory in a binary format. Unlike other objects, however, the DataSet object is always remoted and serialized in a special XML format, called a DiffGram. (We’ll look at the DiffGram format and the relative API in more detail in Chapter 10.) When the DataSet object trespasses across the boundaries of the application domains (AppDomains), or the physical borders of the machine, it is automatically rendered as a DiffGram. At its destination, the DataSet object is silently rebuilt as a binary and immediately usable object.

In ADO.NET, serialization of an object is performed either through the public ISerializable interface or through public methods that ...