Structures to byte arrays and vice versa?

[ORC]

Hi,
I have posted almost the same message in the compact framework group, but it
seems to got lost in a deep message structure :-) so I'll try again:

I'll receive a byte array from a serial port. The byte arrays are actually
serialized structures with alignments of 4 (pack = 4). The structures were
originally written in C++ and looks e.g. like this:
struct Parameters
{
double CreatedDate;
byte Initials[13];
double TempSensorOffse t;
double TempSensorSlope ;
double MathReverseCoef[3][3];
double MathForwardCoef[3][3];
double StrainsOffset[3];
double StrainsSlope[3];
};

In C++ I just had to create a Union consisting of the structure and a byte
array and then I had directly access to both withhout having to do any kind
of conversion. How should I do this in C# using (I need to both send and
receive so the I'm looking for a code that both serializes and de-serializes
the structure)? The code must be supported by the Compact Framework.

- If your advise is to use the CustomMarshaler from opennetcf then:
Does the Marshaller work in both full and compact framework? - does anyone
have a simple example on how to use it (I have read the "Creating a Custom
Marshaler for the .NET Compact Framework" article , but I'm afraid it is too
heavy for me at the state I am - please clarify.

Thank you very much for your help!
Ole

[richlm]

A safe and simple approach would be to use the (strangely named)
System.BitConve rter class, which converts between primitive types and byte
arrays.
You'll still have to do some work to return a single byte array for your
class/structure.