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Creating schemas from .NET types

Creating schemas from complex .NET types is a time-saving way to get started with Avro. Chr.Avro recognizes most commonly used types and supports classes, structs, and enums, so it’s usually possible to get a working schema with no additional manipulation.

For detailed information about how types are matched to schemas, see the types and conversions documentation.

Installing the CLI

If you haven’t already, install the Chr.Avro CLI:

$ dotnet tool install Chr.Avro.Cli --global
Tool 'chr.avro.cli' (version '10.5.0') was successfully installed.

After the CLI tool has been installed, you can invoke it using dotnet avro. If the install command fails, make sure you have the latest version of the .NET Core SDK installed.

Using the CLI

To create a schema for a type, use the create command. You’ll need to provide the type’s full name as well as the path to a compiled assembly that contains it:

$ dotnet avro create --type ExampleNamespace.ExampleLibrary.ExampleClass --assembly bin/Debug/netstandard2.0/ExampleNamespace.ExampleLibrary.dll
{"name":"ExampleNamespace.ExampleLibrary.ExampleClass","type":"record","fields":[{"name":"ExampleProperty","type":"int"}]}

Customizing generated schemas

The CLI ships with some convenience options:

  • The --nullable-references option causes all reference types to be written as nullable unions. This is useful when you prefer to keep .NET’s nullable semantics.

  • The --enums-as-integers option causes enums to be represented as "int" or "long" schemas instead of "enum" schemas.

Chr.Avro also recognizes data contract attributes, which can be used to customize names.

If you need to make more complicated modifications to a generated schema, you can customize the schema creation process in code:

using Chr.Avro.Abstract;
using Chr.Avro.Representation;
using System;

namespace Chr.Avro.Examples.SchemaCustomization
{
    public class ExampleClass
    {
        public int NumericProperty { get; set; }
    }

    public class Program
    {
        public static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            var builder = new SchemaBuilder();
            var schema = builder.BuildSchema<ExampleClass>(); // a RecordSchema instance

            // do modifications here

            var writer = new JsonSchemaWriter();
            Console.WriteLine(writer.Write(schema));
        }
    }
}