serialization - Convert Any type in scala to Array[Byte] and back

Question

I have a variable value declared as Any in my program.

I want to convert this value to Array[Byte].

How can I serialize to Array[Byte] and back? I found examples related to other types such as Double or Int, but not to Any.

Answer 1

This should do what you need. It's pretty similar to how one would do it in Java.

import java.io.{ByteArrayInputStream, ByteArrayOutputStream, ObjectInputStream, ObjectOutputStream}

object Serialization extends App {

  def serialise(value: Any): Array[Byte] = {
    val stream: ByteArrayOutputStream = new ByteArrayOutputStream()
    val oos = new ObjectOutputStream(stream)
    oos.writeObject(value)
    oos.close()
    stream.toByteArray
  }

  def deserialise(bytes: Array[Byte]): Any = {
    val ois = new ObjectInputStream(new ByteArrayInputStream(bytes))
    val value = ois.readObject
    ois.close()
    value
  }

  println(deserialise(serialise("My Test")))
  println(deserialise(serialise(List(1))))
  println(deserialise(serialise(Map(1 -> 2))))
  println(deserialise(serialise(1)))
}