Using boost::describe to serialize/unserialize xml (xml_oarchive/xm_iarchive is too limited)

[vricosti]

Hi,

I am using describe to serialize.unserialize some structs to json (thanks to boost::json) but now I would also be able to do it in xml.
I tried boost::archive::: (xml_oarchive/xml_iarchive) but the resulting xml always have some useless nodes ( <xxx_version>) that cannot be easily removed from what I understand.
Let's consider the following code:

namespace JsonSerializer
{
   struct Item
   {
      std::string id;
      std::string label;
      std::string iconFile;
   };
   BOOST_DESCRIBE_STRUCT(Item, (), (id, label, iconFile))

   struct Items
   {
      using Type = std::vector<Item>;
      Type items;
   };
   BOOST_DESCRIBE_STRUCT(Items, (), (items));

} // namespace JsonSerializer


// Lines below allows to not add bunch of ugly tags/info when serializing in xml
BOOST_CLASS_IMPLEMENTATION(JsonSerializer::Item, boost::serialization::object_serializable);
BOOST_CLASS_IMPLEMENTATION(JsonSerializer::Items::Type, boost::serialization::object_serializable);
BOOST_CLASS_IMPLEMENTATION(JsonSerializer::Items, boost::serialization::object_serializable);

Then I try to fill an Items object and I serialize it:

Items items;
// ... some code to fill items list ...
std::ostringstream os;
unsigned int flags = boost::archive::no_header;
boost::archive::xml_oarchive ar(os, flags);
ar << boost::make_nvp("items", items.items);
std::string sXml = os.str();

And the resulting xml looks like this:

<items>
	<count>1</count>
	<item_version>0</item_version>
	<item>
		<id>standalone</id>
		<label>StandAlone</label>
		<iconFile>Logo_StandAlone.png</iconFile>
	</item>
</items>

Even with all the ugly BOOST_CLASS_IMPLEMENTATION macros and the use of boost::archive::no_header, the result is not satisfying (useless item_version, count), so where should I start to get a clean xml ?
What can boost offers to serialize/unserialize in xml with boost/describe ?
It works fine with json so why not with xml ?