# What is the use of the type information in the serialized xml

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/what-is-the-use-of-the-type-information-in-the-serialized-xml/184826>\
**Category:** Rails\
**Created:** [March 9, 2010, 9:14am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/what-is-the-use-of-the-type-information-in-the-serialized-xml/184826 "2010-03-09T09:14:55Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![deepak](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/7bcc69/32.png) [@deepak](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/deepak)\
**Post date:** [March 9, 2010, 9:14am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/what-is-the-use-of-the-type-information-in-the-serialized-xml/184826/1 "2010-03-09T09:14:55Z")

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hi,  
i had a general question, what is the use of the type information in  
the serialized xml?

\<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?\> \</posts

what is the use of saying that posts is of type ‘array’, any use to  
ActiveRecord or ActiveResource?  
would it be useful in deserialization?

PS: ActiveRecord::Base::to\_xml has a :skip\_types option.

Thanks,  
Deepak