The code below fills the properties of my model from the DataReader.I made some properties Nullable and it isn't working since then.
foreach (var property in _properties)
{
property.SetValue(model, null, null);
if (columnsInDataReader.Contains(property.Name.ToLower()))
{
if (!(_dataReader[property.Name] == DBNull.Value))
property.SetValue(model, _dataReader[property.Name]);
}
}
The property is Int32? and the database column is smallint and the conversion fails.
Even if an implicit conversion from short to int? do exists, the issue here arises from the fact that the data reader returns a boxed short, for which you need an unboxing conversion. In this specific case, the conversion is from object to a value type (int?).
The paragraph that matches your situation is the last of the cited section: since the object returned is a boxed short and not a boxed int, the cast fails.
As a concrete example, compare these two snippets:
short src = 42;
int? dst = (int?)src;
object src = (short)42;
int? dst = (int?)src;
While the first one succeeds, the second throws an InvalidCastException.
In your case, no explicit cast occurs, however the call to SetValue applies similar conversion rules, and therefore fails.
Summing up, in order to have the call succeed, you must choose the type of the property among those that are castable at runtime from the type of the extracted object, such as short and short?.
Related
I have this method:
private static Dossier PrepareDossier(List<List<object>> rawDossier)
{
return new Dossier((int)rawDossier[0][0]);
}
When I use it I get an InvalidCastException. However, when I use Convert.ToInt32(rawDossier[0][0]) it works just fine. What is the problem?
The problem is that you don't cast an object to an int, you're attempting to unbox an int.
The object really has to be an int. It cannot be just anything that can be converted to an int.
So the difference is that this:
int a = (int)obj;
Really needs obj to be a boxed int, nothing else, whereas this:
int a = Convert.ToInt32(obj);
Will execute the ToInt32 method which will try to figure out what is really going on and do the right thing.
The "right thing" here is to ensure the object in question implements IConvertible and calling IConvertible.ToInt32, as is evident from the reference source:
public static int ToInt32(object value) {
return value == null? 0: ((IConvertible)value).ToInt32(null);
}
You can see the unboxing on try roslyn:
IL_0007: unbox.any [mscorlib]System.Int32
Conclusion: The object you're trying to unbox is not an int, but it is something that can be converted to an int.
I would guess this is because the object in your list is not an int.
Convert.ToInt32 will convert other non-int types so works.
Check what is being passed in to the method.
When you try to unbox int from an object, the boxed value should be int, otherwise you will receive an exception, while Convert.ToInt32 uses IConvertible implementation of boxed type to convert the value to int.
For example if the value which is boxed is string "100", unboxing it will throw an exception but using Convert.ToInt32, internally uses int.Parse.
Boxing and Unboxing (C# Programming Guide)
Attempting to unbox a reference to an incompatible value type causes
an InvalidCastException.
I am trying to determine the difference between a DateTime and a DateTime? using reflection. Please see my test code below:
public class TestClass
{
public DateTime testDate1 { get; set; }
public DateTime? testDate2 { get; set; }
}
public void Test()
{
TestClass testing = new TestClass();
var props = typeof(TestClass).GetProperties();
foreach (PropertyInfo p in props)
{
object o = p.GetValue(testing);
if (typeof(DateTime?).IsInstanceOfType(o))
{
o = DateTime.Now;
}
if (typeof(DateTime).IsInstanceOfType(o))
{
if (((DateTime)o) == DateTime.MinValue)
{
o = null;
}
}
Console.WriteLine(string.Format("{0} = {1}", p.Name, (o ?? "NULL").ToString()));
}
}
The output of this code is the opposite to what i would expect. Currently the output is:
testDate1 = 26/01/2016 16:15:00
testDate2 = NULL
I am expecting testDate1 to be null and testDate2 to contain the value.
When debugging this code, it seems that the first pass using testDate1 passes both of the typeof if statements, the second fails both of the if statements. Can anybody help me understand and hopefully try and catch the specific nullable instance of the date time?
To note i have also tried switching to a definition and test on Nullable just in case, but it made no difference.
Many thanks!
First, keep in mind that testDate1 can never be null because DateTime is a struct. If you declare a DateTime without intitializing it, it will get the default value of DateTime.MinValue. testDate2, on the other hand, is a Nullable struct, where the default value is null(-ish... it's actually a value that represents null, but not null itself).
IsInstanceOfType is using o's GetType() method in the background to verify that its type is the same as the type you are comparing to (in this case, DateTime?). However, if you take a look at the documentation, it states:
Calling GetType on a Nullable type causes a boxing operation to be performed when the type is implicitly converted to Object. Therefore GetType always returns a Type object that represents the underlying type, not the Nullable type.
So, if you step through the foreach loop for the testDate1 property, you'll see that the first condition will return true (since testDate1 can't be null, which means it has to be of type DateTime). You then step into the second if-condition (though that's effectively just doing the same check again), but you don't enter the inner if because o currently has a value of DateTime.Now.
Now stepping through for testDate2 (which is holds a null value), you will see that you don't enter either of the if-conditionals because null doesn't have a type. As such, your object will remain null throughout the second iteration of the loop, giving you the output you see there.
NOTE: Just so you know, the way you're "assigning" values to o doesn't modify the original TestClass at all. Consider the following:
TestClass testing = new TestClass();
var prop = typeof(TestClass).GetProperty("testDate1");
// Here we get the current value of testing.testDate1, which is the default DateTime.MinValue
object o = prop.GetValue(testing);
// Here we set o to null... has ZERO effect on testing.testDate1.
o = null;
// What you actually want is probably the following.
// (Remember though that testDate1 can't be null... this just sets it back to DateTime.MinValue.)
prop.SetValue(testing, null);
The answer is you can't.
If you have an object date there is no way to know if it orginally comes from a nullabe DateTime or not.
DateTime? nullable = DateTime.Now;
object o = nullable;
The assignment to o is morally equivalent to
object temp = null;
if (nullable.HasValue)
{
temp = nullable.Value;
}
o = temp;
As you can see, the information of the nullable type is lost and what you are really getting is the boxed nullable's value.
This is easy to see by simply doing o.GetType() which will return DateTime if the nullable had a value or you will get a NullReferenceException if it didn't.
This does not mean that you can not determine if the declared type of a property, method or member is nullable or not. You can do this easily enough via reflection.
Thank you for so much useful comments and links. I realise that it was the property i should have been inspecting and not the object. I am using this:
Nullable.GetUnderlyingType(p.PropertyType)
It allows me to determine what i am dealing with and is pretty effective. I still end up switching on typeof(T).Name but i will cross that bridge when i come to it :)
I have to live with the fact that functional code vs ugly code remains an internal battle!
Consider the following code:
void Handler(object o, EventArgs e)
{
// I swear o is a string
string s = (string)o; // 1
//-OR-
string s = o as string; // 2
// -OR-
string s = o.ToString(); // 3
}
What is the difference between the three types of casting (okay, the 3rd one is not a casting, but you get the intent). Which one should be preferred?
string s = (string)o; // 1
Throws InvalidCastException if o is not a string. Otherwise, assigns o to s, even if o is null.
string s = o as string; // 2
Assigns null to s if o is not a string or if o is null. For this reason, you cannot use it with value types (the operator could never return null in that case). Otherwise, assigns o to s.
string s = o.ToString(); // 3
Causes a NullReferenceException if o is null. Assigns whatever o.ToString() returns to s, no matter what type o is.
Use 1 for most conversions - it's simple and straightforward. I tend to almost never use 2 since if something is not the right type, I usually expect an exception to occur. I have only seen a need for this return-null type of functionality with badly designed libraries which use error codes (e.g. return null = error, instead of using exceptions).
3 is not a cast and is just a method invocation. Use it for when you need the string representation of a non-string object.
string s = (string)o; Use when something should
definitely be the other thing.
string s = o as string; Use when something might be the other
thing.
string s = o.ToString(); Use when you don't care what
it is but you just want to use the
available string representation.
It really depends on whether you know if o is a string and what you want to do with it. If your comment means that o really really is a string, I'd prefer the straight (string)o cast - it's unlikely to fail.
The biggest advantage of using the straight cast is that when it fails, you get an InvalidCastException, which tells you pretty much what went wrong.
With the as operator, if o isn't a string, s is set to null, which is handy if you're unsure and want to test s:
string s = o as string;
if ( s == null )
{
// well that's not good!
gotoPlanB();
}
However, if you don't perform that test, you'll use s later and have a NullReferenceException thrown. These tend to be more common and a lot harder to track down once they happens out in the wild, as nearly every line dereferences a variable and may throw one. On the other hand, if you're trying to cast to a value type (any primitive, or structs such as DateTime), you have to use the straight cast - the as won't work.
In the special case of converting to a string, every object has a ToString, so your third method may be okay if o isn't null and you think the ToString method might do what you want.
'as' is based on 'is', which is a keyword that checks at runtime if the object is polimorphycally compatible (basically if a cast can be made) and returns null if the check fails.
These two are equivalent:
Using 'as':
string s = o as string;
Using 'is':
if(o is string)
s = o;
else
s = null;
On the contrary, the c-style cast is made also at runtime, but throws an exception if the cast cannot be made.
Just to add an important fact:
The 'as' keyword only works with reference types. You cannot do:
// I swear i is an int
int number = i as int;
In those cases you have to use casting.
If you already know what type it can cast to, use a C-style cast:
var o = (string) iKnowThisIsAString;
Note that only with a C-style cast can you perform explicit type coercion.
If you don't know whether it's the desired type and you're going to use it if it is, use as keyword:
var s = o as string;
if (s != null) return s.Replace("_","-");
//or for early return:
if (s==null) return;
Note that as will not call any type conversion operators. It will only be non-null if the object is not null and natively of the specified type.
Use ToString() to get a human-readable string representation of any object, even if it can't cast to string.
The as keyword is good in asp.net when you use the FindControl method.
Hyperlink link = this.FindControl("linkid") as Hyperlink;
if (link != null)
{
...
}
This means you can operate on the typed variable rather then having to then cast it from object like you would with a direct cast:
object linkObj = this.FindControl("linkid");
if (link != null)
{
Hyperlink link = (Hyperlink)linkObj;
}
It's not a huge thing, but it saves lines of code and variable assignment, plus it's more readable
According to experiments run on this page: http://www.dotnetguru2.org/sebastienros/index.php/2006/02/24/cast_vs_as
(this page is having some "illegal referrer" errors show up sometimes, so just refresh if it does)
Conclusion is, the "as" operator is normally faster than a cast. Sometimes by many times faster, sometimes just barely faster.
I peronsonally thing "as" is also more readable.
So, since it is both faster and "safer" (wont throw exception), and possibly easier to read, I recommend using "as" all the time.
2 is useful for casting to a derived type.
Suppose a is an Animal:
b = a as Badger;
c = a as Cow;
if (b != null)
b.EatSnails();
else if (c != null)
c.EatGrass();
will get a fed with a minimum of casts.
"(string)o" will result in an InvalidCastException as there's no direct cast.
"o as string" will result in s being a null reference, rather than an exception being thrown.
"o.ToString()" isn't a cast of any sort per-se, it's a method that's implemented by object, and thus in one way or another, by every class in .net that "does something" with the instance of the class it's called on and returns a string.
Don't forget that for converting to string, there's also Convert.ToString(someType instanceOfThatType) where someType is one of a set of types, essentially the frameworks base types.
It seems the two of them are conceptually different.
Direct Casting
Types don't have to be strictly related. It comes in all types of flavors.
Custom implicit/explicit casting: Usually a new object is created.
Value Type Implicit: Copy without losing information.
Value Type Explicit: Copy and information might be lost.
IS-A relationship: Change reference type, otherwise throws exception.
Same type: 'Casting is redundant'.
It feels like the object is going to be converted into something else.
AS operator
Types have a direct relationship. As in:
Reference Types: IS-A relationship Objects are always the same, just the reference changes.
Value Types: Copy boxing and nullable types.
It feels like the you are going to handle the object in a different way.
Samples and IL
class TypeA
{
public int value;
}
class TypeB
{
public int number;
public static explicit operator TypeB(TypeA v)
{
return new TypeB() { number = v.value };
}
}
class TypeC : TypeB { }
interface IFoo { }
class TypeD : TypeA, IFoo { }
void Run()
{
TypeA customTypeA = new TypeD() { value = 10 };
long longValue = long.MaxValue;
int intValue = int.MaxValue;
// Casting
TypeB typeB = (TypeB)customTypeA; // custom explicit casting -- IL: call class ConsoleApp1.Program/TypeB ConsoleApp1.Program/TypeB::op_Explicit(class ConsoleApp1.Program/TypeA)
IFoo foo = (IFoo)customTypeA; // is-a reference -- IL: castclass ConsoleApp1.Program/IFoo
int loseValue = (int)longValue; // explicit -- IL: conv.i4
long dontLose = intValue; // implict -- IL: conv.i8
// AS
int? wraps = intValue as int?; // nullable wrapper -- IL: call instance void valuetype [System.Runtime]System.Nullable`1<int32>::.ctor(!0)
object o1 = intValue as object; // box -- IL: box [System.Runtime]System.Int32
TypeD d1 = customTypeA as TypeD; // reference conversion -- IL: isinst ConsoleApp1.Program/TypeD
IFoo f1 = customTypeA as IFoo; // reference conversion -- IL: isinst ConsoleApp1.Program/IFoo
//TypeC d = customTypeA as TypeC; // wouldn't compile
}
All given answers are good, if i might add something:
To directly use string's methods and properties (e.g. ToLower) you can't write:
(string)o.ToLower(); // won't compile
you can only write:
((string)o).ToLower();
but you could write instead:
(o as string).ToLower();
The as option is more readable (at least to my opinion).
string s = o as string; // 2
Is prefered, as it avoids the performance penalty of double casting.
I would like to attract attention to the following specifics of the as operator:
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/csharp/language-reference/keywords/as
Note that the as operator performs only reference conversions,
nullable conversions, and boxing conversions. The as operator can't
perform other conversions, such as user-defined conversions, which
should instead be performed by using cast expressions.
Use direct cast string s = (string) o; if in the logical context of your app string is the only valid type. With this approach, you will get InvalidCastException and implement the principle of Fail-fast. Your logic will be protected from passing the invalid type further or get NullReferenceException if used as operator.
If the logic expects several different types cast string s = o as string; and check it on null or use is operator.
New cool feature have appeared in C# 7.0 to simplify cast and check is a Pattern matching:
if(o is string s)
{
// Use string variable s
}
or
switch (o)
{
case int i:
// Use int variable i
break;
case string s:
// Use string variable s
break;
}
When trying to get the string representation of anything (of any type) that could potentially be null, I prefer the below line of code. It's compact, it invokes ToString(), and it correctly handles nulls. If o is null, s will contain String.Empty.
String s = String.Concat(o);
Since nobody mentioned it, the closest to instanceOf to Java by keyword is this:
obj.GetType().IsInstanceOfType(otherObj)
The method below looks for a particular key in a dictionary and attempts to safely store it in destination if it can. The problem I am running into is when T=Int64 and the item in the dictionary is Int32 or UInt32 (both of which can fit inside an Int64 without data loss). valueAsObject is T returns false when T is Int64 and valueAsObject is Int32.
Is it possible to safely cast valueAsObject to T without just trying it and catching any exceptions? I would like to avoid exceptions, though if that is the only way I can make it work.
public static void MyMethod<T>(IDictionary<String, Object> dictionary, String key, ref T destination)
{
if (!dictionary.ContainsKey(key))
return;
var valueAsObject = dictionary[key];
if (!(valueAsObject is T))
return;
destination = (T)valueAsObject;
}
Basically, I want the function to do nothing (return) if the thing found in the dictionary can not be safely stored in a type T variable (without data loss), otherwise it should cast it as necessary and store it.
This is not built-in at the language or runtime level. You can use Convert.ChangeType to perform the conversion. This method also performs lossy conversions so you probably have to build your own conversion logic (which will involve casts and be ugly).
You can't just do something like this?
public static void MyMethod<T>( IDictionary<string,object> dictionary , string key , ref T destination )
{
object value ;
bool found = dictionary.TryGetValue( key , out value ) ;
if (found && value is T)
{
destination = (T) value ;
}
return;
}
The is operator:
evaluates to true if the provided expression is non-null, and the provided object
can be cast to the provided type without causing an exception to be thrown.
.
.
.
Note that the is operator only considers reference conversions, boxing conversions,
and unboxing conversions. Other conversions, such as user-defined conversions, are not considered.
Basically, if the object directly inherits from the specified type, or implements the type (if T is an interface), is should return true and you should be able to down-cast the object to your type T.
If, however, you need to worry about user-defined conversion operators, you'll need to reflect over the object's type and over typeof(T) to see if a user-defined conversion operator is defined on either type that will convert the object to a compatible type. Getting that right is likely to be...tricky.
This is the final solution I went with. It came from a number of comments and other answers so I encourage reading the other answers/comments for additional details as to why this was necessary:
private static void GetFromDictionary<T>(IDictionary<String, Object> dictionary, String key, ref T outputLocation)
{
if (!dictionary.ContainsKey(key))
return;
var valueAsObject = dictionary[key];
if (!CanBeCastTo<T>(valueAsObject))
return;
outputLocation = (T)Convert.ChangeType(valueAsObject, typeof(T));
}
private static bool CanBeCastTo<T>(Object thingToCast)
{
if (thingToCast is T)
return true;
var tType = typeof(T);
if (tType == typeof(Int64) && thingToCast is Int32)
return true;
if (tType == typeof(Double) && thingToCast is Decimal)
return true;
return false;
}
In my case, I only needed to handle a certain subset of primitive types (Int32, Int64, String, Double, Decimal) and I was willing to accept lossy conversion of Decimal to Double.
The take away here is that the "is" operator will return false for primitives even if it can fit without loss (Int32 in Int64). Also, (T)valueAsObject will not do an explicit typecast. So if valueAsObject is of type Int32 and T is of type Int64 the above will throw an exception even though (Int64)valueAsObject is valid. This one bit me but luckily #usr suggested using Convert.ChangeType which handles the problem.
Optimizations could be made to the above code but I chose to leave it as is for readability.
This question already has answers here:
Closed 13 years ago.
Possible Duplicates:
Casting: (NewType) vs. Object as NewType
Why is the C# “as” operator so popular?
Hey,
I know this may be a silly question but this doubt came to me today.
What is the difference between doing
String text = (String) variable;
and
String text = variable as String;
?
A cast can do three things:
Perform a user-defined conversion
Perform an unboxing conversion
Perform a reference conversion
An as operation is almost always a reference conversion, the only exception being unboxing to a nullable type:
object x = "hello";
int? y = x as int?; // y is null afterwards
Then there's the behaviour with conversions which fail at execution time. So the differences are:
Casts performing reference conversions or unboxing will throw InvalidCastException on failure; as will result in the null value of the target type instead
Casts can perform user-defined conversions; as can't
Casts can unbox to non-nullable value types; as can only be used for unboxing if the target type is a nullable value type
as will return null if variable isn't actually of that type (String in this case). The cast will throw an exception.
Here is the link to Eric Lippert's blog on casting in C#. I'd summarize it, but it's pretty short and he'll explain it much better than me.
http://blogs.msdn.com/ericlippert/archive/2009/10/08/what-s-the-difference-between-as-and-cast-operators.aspx
And here is his post on the cast operator:
http://blogs.msdn.com/ericlippert/archive/2009/03/19/representation-and-identity.aspx
There are a lot of different ways to cast in C#.
This will try to cast the reference to a String reference. If the cast fails, it throws an exception:
string text = (String) variable;
This will try to cast the reference to a String reference. If the cast fails, it will return a null reference to be assigned to the variable:
string text = varible as String;
This will cast a string reference to an object reference, which is a safe casting as String inherits from Object:
object text = (object)"1337";
Casting to a parent class can also be done implicitly:
object text = "1337";
This will box a value inside an object, then unbox it to a plain value again:
int value = 42;
object boxed = (object)value;
int valueAgain = (int)boxed;
The boxing can also be done implicitly:
int value = 42;
object boxed = value;
int valueAgain = (int)boxed;
This will make a widening conversion from byte to int:
byte a = 42;
int b = (int)a;
The same works as an implicit conversion:
byte a = 42;
int b = a;
This will make a narrowing conversion from int to byte, throwing away the overflow:
int a = 512;
byte b = (byte)a; // b now contains 0