difficulty serializing a collection in web api 2 using knockoutjs - asp.net

Question

I have a knockoutjs web page doing a post to a VB .net Web API. for some reason my collection always shows nothing on the controller.
on the web page in the post here is my data.
data: ko.toJSON({
ShpmntCntrlNbr: self.ShpmntCntrlNbr,
MstrBillNbr: self.MstrBillNbr,
accesorialChangesHaveBeenMade: self.accesorialChangesHaveBeenMade,
DB2ACTCollection: actCollection
}),
this shows in the console (chrome developer tools) like this.
{
"ShpmntCntrlNbr":"11019813",
"MstrBillNbr":" ",
"accesorialChangesHaveBeenMade":true,
"DB2ACTCollection":[
{"ShpmntCntrlNbr":"11019813"}
]
}
here is .net VB controller
Public Function Post(data As VMFreightReleaseSaveDB2ChangesInput) As IHttpActionResult
Return Ok()
End Function
unfortunately when I put a stop sign in here and inspect data. I get
DB2ACTCollection Nothing
MstrBillNbr " "
ShpmntCntrlNbr "1101983"
accesorialChangesHaveBeenMade True
no clue why my DBACTCollection is showing as nothing. any thoughts?
and here are the classes.
Public Class VMFreightReleaseSaveDB2ChangesInput
Public Property ShpmntCntrlNbr() As String
Get
Return m_ShpmntCntrlNbr
End Get
Set(value As String)
m_ShpmntCntrlNbr = value
End Set
End Property
Private m_ShpmntCntrlNbr As String
Public Property MstrBillNbr() As String
Get
Return m_MstrBillNbr
End Get
Set(value As String)
m_MstrBillNbr = value
End Set
End Property
Private m_MstrBillNbr As String
Public Property accesorialChangesHaveBeenMade() As Boolean
Get
Return m_accesorialChangesHaveBeenMade
End Get
Set(value As Boolean)
m_accesorialChangesHaveBeenMade = value
End Set
End Property
Private m_accesorialChangesHaveBeenMade
Public Property DB2ACTCollection() As List(Of DB2_ACT2)
Get
Return m_DB2ACTCollection
End Get
Set(value As List(Of DB2_ACT2))
value = m_DB2ACTCollection
End Set
End Property
Private m_DB2ACTCollection As List(Of DB2_ACT2)
and
Public Class DB2_ACT2
Public Property ShpmntCntrlNbr() As String
Get
Return m_ShpmntCntrlNbr
End Get
Set(value As String)
m_ShpmntCntrlNbr = value
End Set
End Property
Private m_ShpmntCntrlNbr As String
End Class
Just a note here is my solution so far, not real happy with it but it seems to be working. instead of data As VMFreightReleaseSaveDB2ChangesInput I have data as JToken. then I just loop through it although I am still at a loss why the native .net web api serializer is not doing this.
Dim inner As JArray = data("DB2ACTCollection")
Dim ACTCollection = New List(Of DB2_ACT)
For Each item As JObject In inner
Dim ACT As New DB2_ACT
ACT.ShpmntCntrlNbr = item("ShpmntCntrlNbr")
ACTCollection.Add(ACT)
Next

Answer 1

Based on the JSON and seeing as the models are POCOs try using auto properties with DB2ACTCollection as an array and see if that deserializes properly
Public Class DB2_ACT2
Public Property ShpmntCntrlNbr As String
End Class
Public Class VMFreightReleaseSaveDB2ChangesInput
Public Property ShpmntCntrlNbr As String
Public Property MstrBillNbr As String
Public Property accesorialChangesHaveBeenMade As Boolean
Public Property DB2ACTCollection As DB2_ACT2()
End Class