Data serialising and encryption

[AggrorJorn]

Does anybody have a recommended C++ library for data serialisation?

 

I want to store it more securely instead of having it freely accesable like XML.

[Canardia]

I would use a sqlite3 database, because then you can also load and save only parts of a level. And then use blowfish2 for encryption.

[Flexman]

XML supports encryption and security certificates. If you're using a library that supports that, might be worth looking at. It's what I'm currently doing in my day job.

[AggrorJorn]

I currently have my own library (C#) that I use to generate xml files. Instead of creating my own library I really want to use a C++ library that has more advanced features.

[ParaToxic]

You can use boost::serialization. It is very fast and has a very good syntax

[ChrisMAN]

Most of the c# serialization coolness is from reflection. C++ doesn't so much have that. There is some cheezy ms proprietary reflection thing... I would be curious to see if c++ has an automapper.

[Josh]

I recommend against serialization.

• There's always data you don't want to include, or data that doesn't translate well.
  
• Your class structure WILL change and invalidate all your serialized data.
  

 

Just write your save routine and decide what data is important. Don't look for a magic routine to make life easier.

 

</offsoapbox>

[Pixel Perfect]

Your class structure WILL change and invalidate all your serialized data.

This is a very real and serious drawback with serialization as a save mechanism!

[AggrorJorn]

What do you use for encrypting your data?

[Roland]

Here is a bunch of the most common ones with some source code

http://embeddedsw.ne...rence_Home.html

 

I have used some of them at work, but for game development not.

[Matthew Nicholls]

Why not just use your xml file but put it in a password protected zip and stream it from there?

[AggrorJorn]

Why not just use your xml file but put it in a password protected zip and stream it from there?

I don't know, it just doesn't 'feel' right to do it that way. That may be a bit vague. It will probably work just fine.

[Rekindled Phoenix]

Maybe you could just obfuscate the data and keep a private key within your source-code?

[Josh]

Why worry about that at all? If the user wants to edit some text files and advance to level 10, why not let them?

[Flexman]

Whatever works.

[Roland]

Yep.. I totally agree with Josh.

[Rekindled Phoenix]

As an alternative, you could use the ProtoBuf library with build-in serialization that's faster than typical XML types. Saving the bytes to file may be obfuscated enough.