Xml serialize get attribute on list node

Question

I currently have a structure as such

[XmlRoot("command")]
public class Command
{
    [XmlArray("itemlist")]
    [XmlArrayItem("item")]
    public List<Item> Items { get; set; }
}

[XmlRoot("item")]
public class Item
{
    [XmlAttribute("itemid")]
    public string ItemID { get; set; }
}

which works great for it's purpose, but given this xml

<command>
    <itemlist totalsize="999">
        <item itemid="1">
        <item itemid="2">
        ...
    </itemlist>
</command>

how do I get totalsize from itemlist when deserializing? The XML is something I receive and is not something i can control.
I'm not looking for GetAttributeValue or similar, but purely using xmlserializer

Answer 1

You need to split itemlist and item into two classes.

[XmlRoot("command")]
public class Command
{
    [XmlElement("itemlist")]
    public ItemList ItemList { get; set; }
}

public class ItemList
{
    [XmlAttribute("totalsize")]
    public int TotalSize { get; set; }

    [XmlElement("item")]
    public List<Item> Items { get; set; }
}

public class Item
{
    [XmlAttribute("itemid")]
    public string ItemID { get; set; }
}

As an aside, note that an XmlRoot attribute is only relevant on the root element. The one you have on Item is ignored in this instance.