User415553908 posted
It's a bit hard to say where the issue is without seeing your models and LINQ queries you use (epsecially those to do with navigation properties).
Suppose, your Customer class looks like so:
class Customer {
public int Id {get;set;}
public int CompanyId {get;set;
public Company Company {get;set;} // another way it can happen would be through the use of navigation properties that reference back, see next class
public Customer ParentCustomer {get;set;} // this would be the prime example of self reference, when ParentCustomer = this
}
class Company {
public int Id {get;set;}
//see documentation for more context: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/ef/ef6/querying/related-data#turn-lazy-loading-off-for-serialization
public virtual List<Customer> Customers {get;set;} // given this is lazily loaded, you risk geting into a loop where your company will have a reference to a customer, that will in turn have reference to the company...
}
to fix this you could change the above structure to add the NotSerialized as follows:
class Customer {
public int Id {get;set;}
public int CompanyId {get;set;
[NonSerialized]
public Customer ParentCustomer {get;set;} // now this will not get serialised into XML
}
class Company {
public int Id {get;set;}
//see documentation for more context: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/ef/ef6/querying/related-data#turn-lazy-loading-off-for-serialization
public List<Customer> Customers {get;set;} // assuming you use EF6, switch to eagerly loading the entities you require
}
I hope this makse sense
