Serialize/Deserialize style traits

Crates like serde can implement serialization automatically.

Derivable: ✅

// Copyright 2025 Google LLC
// SPDX-License-Identifier: Apache-2.0

#[derive(Serialize, Deserialize)]
struct ExtraData {
    fav_color: String,
    name_of_dog: String,
}

#[derive(Serialize, Deserialize)]
struct Data {
    name: String,
    age: usize,
    extra_data: ExtraData,
}

  • Provides serialization and deserialization functionality for a type, allowing for Rust data types to be converted to/from data formats like JSON.

  • The standard library doesn’t have serialization functionality built-in, but the serde crate is the community standard interface for doing serialization.

  • When not to implement: If a type contains sensitive data that should not be erroneously saved to disk or sent over a network, consider not implementing Serialize/Deserialize for that type.

    Shares security concerns with Debug, but given serialization is often used in networking there can be higher stakes.