Python-like pickling of full Javascript objects

You might want to look at hunterloftis/cryo. From the readme:

Built for node.js and browsers. Cryo is inspired by Python's pickle and works similarly to JSON.stringify() and JSON.parse(). Cryo.stringify() and Cryo.parse() improve on JSON in these circumstances:

• Undefined
• Date
• Infinity
• Object references
• Attached properties
• Functions
• DOM Nodes

There is a brief discussion with the author at r/programming.

The source is straightforward, no magic.

I haven't tried it yet.

It doesn't fit perfectly but you can try to use occamsrazor.js . Doing this you can use JSON serialization:

// this is your costructor function
function Circle(attrs){
    this.radius = attrs.radius;
}
Circle.prototype.area = function (){
    return this.radius*this.radius*Math.PI;
}
Circle.prototype.perimeter = function (){
    return 2*this.radius*Math.PI;
}

// this is a validator
function hasRadius(obj){
    return radius in obj;
}

// this is your factory function
objFactory = occamsrazor().addContructor(hasRadius, Circle);

// this is your deserialized object
var json = '{"radius": 10}';

// circle now is a full fledged object
var circle = objFactory(JSON.parse(json));

The drawback is that you don't get a snapshot of an object like using pickle, you recreate a new object. But it may be convenient in some circunstances.

Check out msgpack. While I have not used it for JavaScript objects, the example seems to imply that it will work for objects and not just JSONs. An added bonus: it's one of the fastest implementations that I've ever used for serialization.

http://nanodeath.github.com/HydrateJS/ (blog article at http://blog.maxaller.name/2011/01/hydratejs-smarter-javascript-serialization) seems to fit some of your requirements, judging in particular by https://github.com/nanodeath/HydrateJS/blob/master/spec/HydrateSpec.js