JSON Serialization

Fallback to True Reflection

For objects that don’t have the [Reflector] attribute, you can opt into a runtime reflection fallback. Property reflection is lazy-loaded — it won’t inspect the type until you actually access a property.

var reflector = someObject.GetReflector(fallbackToTrueReflection: true);

Not trim or AOT safe

The fallback reflects over a type that is only known at runtime, so the trimmer can’t tell which properties to keep. The two-argument GetReflector overload is marked [RequiresUnreferencedCode] and will produce an IL2026 warning in trimmed or Native AOT apps.

The parameterless GetReflector() overload only ever returns a source-generated reflector, so it is trim and AOT safe — prefer it, and mark the types you reflect over with [Reflector].

JSON Serialization

ReflectorJsonConverter serializes through the generated reflectors rather than System.Text.Json’s own reflection-based metadata:

var options = new JsonSerializerOptions();

// Factory converter — works for all [Reflector] types
options.Converters.Add(new ReflectorJsonConverter());

// Or target a specific type
options.Converters.Add(new ReflectorJsonConverter<MyModel>());

var json = JsonSerializer.Serialize(model, options);
var deserialized = JsonSerializer.Deserialize<MyModel>(json, options);

Not trim or AOT safe

Property values are still handed to the Type-based JsonSerializer overloads, and the factory converter instantiates types that are only known at runtime. Both ReflectorJsonConverter and ReflectorJsonConverter<T> are therefore marked [RequiresUnreferencedCode] and [RequiresDynamicCode], and produce IL2026/IL3050 warnings in trimmed or Native AOT apps.

For those apps use a JsonSerializerContext, or Shiny.Extensions.Serialization, which wraps the source-generated contexts for you.