I'm not even close to as experienced in C# as I am in C++, but trying to get better.
In C#, does there exist a way to create a base class that contains a property which is a List and then in the derived class define what T is for that concrete type?
public class Base
{
public List<T> Data { get; set; }
}
public class Derived : Base
{
// Declare to the world you use Base.data<Elephant>
// Callers of my Data property get Elephants
}
I imagine not, since you can no longer act on the interface in the base class since you wouldn't know what type you are getting until you know what type the actual instance is, but maybe there is some magical thing in C# that is similar to this?
You can make the base class generic like this:
public class Base<T>
{
public List<T> Data { get; set; }
}
And then when you create the derived class, you can specify T like this:
public class Derived : Base<Elephant>
{
}
For the consumers of Derived, the type of the Data property is List<Elephant>.
Related
I am struggling to formulate my question properly, I hope I can clarify it through the following description:
I have an abstract generic base class that is supposed to describe a specific container item, upon other things, and another abstract class of the same name to reference the generic classes by. I also created an interface to reference them by, both work but still result in the same issue eventually. For this example i am using the shared base class
public abstract class ItemEditorState
{
}
and the derived generic class
public abstract class ItemEditorState<T> : ItemEditorState where T : Item
{
public abstract SimpleDatabase<T> Items { get; set; }
public abstract void DoStuff();
...
}
So far so good.
Now I have classes deriving from ItemEditorState<T> corresponding to different Items.
public class EditorStateItemA : ItemEditorState<ItemA>
{
private ItemADatabase _itemADatabase; //ItemADatabase is public class ItemADatabase : SimpleDatabase<ItemA> {}
public override SimpleDatabase<ItemA> Items { get => _itemADatabase; set => _itemADatabase = value; }
public override void DoStuff(){}
...
}
So far so good again.
Now I have a static manager class holding a List<ItemEditorState> of references to all ItemEditorStates, such as EditorStateItemA, EditorStateItemB etc.
public static class ItemEditorStateManager
{
public static List<ItemEditorState> itemEditorStates = new List<ItemEditorState>();
public int GetState(int index) => itemEditorStates[index];
}
But since I reference the derived class instances by the shared abstract base class (or in another case the IItemEditorState interface), I can't access any members.
What I would like to do is access the Items list of any of EditorStateItemA or EditorStateItemB within the list in the ItemEditorStateManagerfrom the ItemEditorStateManager.GetState(index) method.
I know I would probably have to cast it to the proper class first, but I don't know the specific type at that point. I am sure my architecture is off, but I can't wrap my head around it.
Been struggling with this for a bit so wanted to see if someone here might know the solution. I have a set of interfaces (and an implementation):
public interface IInputValue
{
}
public interface IInputValue<T> : IInputValue where T : struct
{
T Value { get; set; }
}
public class ButtonInputValue : IInputValue<bool>
{
private bool m_Value;
public bool Value
{
get => m_Value;
set => m_Value = value;
}
}
And then I have a scriptable object class that inherits and uses implementations of IInputValue<T>.
public abstract class InputTrigger : ScriptableObject
{
}
public abstract class InputTrigger<T> : InputTrigger where T : IInputValue
{
public abstract T InputValue { get; }
}
T for example, could be ButtonInputValue. I want to serialize this scriptable object in another class (as InputTrigger) and simply be able to call .InputValue on it to get the correct derived type of IInputValue or just get the primitive value directly through IInputValue<T>.Value. What's the best way to go about doing this? Any help is much appreciated.
I think you are trying to use interfaces in the wrong way.
The purpose of an interface is to abstract common functionality on potentially completely different objects and not caring about the base class that implements the interface.
For instance:
You can have a car object and a electric car objects and they can both accelerate and brake. They do so in different ways but all you need to know is that they can accelerate and brake using the pedals (the interface), without you going to learn to drive a car once again.
To answer your question, I think you can use the interface as a type and call the method on the object, and in case you need to verify it is a certain type that implements that interface you can cast to it.
IInputValue<bool> myInputValue;
(ButtonInputValue) myInputValue; // This will be treated as ButtonInputValue because the class implements the IInputValue interface.
I currently have a small object hierarchy that looks like this:
public class BaseClass {
// this class is empty and exists only so the others can extend it and share the
// same base type
}
public class ChildA : BaseClass {
public Subject<AssociatedClassA> Results;
}
public class ChildB : BaseClass {
public Subject<AssociatedClassB> Results;
}
In my design I would like to enforce that every class that extends from BaseClass should contain a Subject<SomeType> called Results. I'm wondering if there is a way that I can move Results into the base class or an interface such that I can supply the generic type for the Subject when constructing the base class. For example, it would be awesome if I could do something like this:
ChildA<AssociatedClassA> instance = new ChildA<AssociatedClassA>();
Or even better since there should really only be one template parameter that matches with ChildA if when I constructed it that could be taken care of for me:
ChildA instance = new ChildA();
// Results is automatically set to Subject<AssociatedClassA>
I'm stuck trying to implement this now as if I try to move Results into the base class the Subject requires a template parameter which I can't necessarily supply. There could potentially be more than 2 derived classes and I don't like the idea that someone extending this system has to know to add Results manually to each child class.
Following the suggestions of the 2 answers below this solves my desire to move Results into the base class, however I've run into another issue in that I was hoping to be able to use BaseClass as a generic parameter to methods such that any of the derived classes could be used. For example:
public void ProcessBaseClass(BaseClass base) {
// base could be ChildA or ChildB here
}
This no longer works since BaseClass now requires a type argument. Is there any way that I can have the best of both worlds here or am I stuck due to my design choices?
If appropriate, you can make the parent generic:
public class BaseClass<T> {
public Subject<T> Results;
}
public class ChildA : BaseClass<AssociatedClassA> {
}
public class ChildB : BaseClass<AssociatedClassB> {
}
You can make the base class itself generic:
public class BaseClass<T> {
public T Results { get; protected set; }
}
I have an abstract base class for a generic 'Device' type and would like to require the derived specific device classes to initialize a list based on their respective differences.
When one sets the derived class to active it must go through the list to set the parameters to active as well. Each derived class will insert their own parameters into the list.
Here is the relevant code:
Base class:
abstract public class Device : Common, IDisposable
{
abstract public Boolean bActive
{
get;
set;
}
abstract List<Parameters> ActiveParameters;
...
}
I don't wish to initialize the List in the base class because I do not know which parameters are going to be inserted into the list from the derived class. This code produces an error saying that I cannot have an abstract field and I understand that but is there a way to require a derived class to initialize a field from the base class?
This code produces an error saying that I cannot have an abstract field and I understand that but is there a way to require a derived class to initialize a field from the base class?
If this is required to be implemented, it should be part of your API. To handle this, you can make this a protected property. This will force it to be implemented by all derived classes.
protected abstract List<Parameters> ActiveParameters { get; }
If this is about initializing the list, then you can force that by putting that list into the constructor (or all constructors, if you have more of them) of the base class.
Something like:
public abstract class Device : Common, IDisposable
{
protected Device(List<Parameters> activeParameters)
{
ActiveParameters = activeParameters;
}
protected List<Parameters> ActiveParameters { get; private set; }
}
The derived class will be then forced to do something like:
public class ConcreteDevice : Device
{
public ConcreteDevice()
: base(new List<Parameters>())
{}
}
I want to create a re-usable library. I was going to use extension methods however I run into some issues in some cases for the client to have to specify in the calling method the types.
QUESTION - If I use an abstract base class as the basis, can I specify an attribute/property in the class to be generic (e.g. the key property might be an 'int' in one case, or a 'string' in another)?
Yes.
public abstract class MyBase<T>
{
public abstract T GetSomething();
}
public class MyConcreteType : MyBase<int>
{
public override int GetSomething()
{
return 3;
}
}
Or, what exactly do you mean ?
(Trying it out would have given you the answer faster then posting it on SO, I think ... )
Yes, you can do the following:
public abstract class Class<T>
{
T value;
T Prop { get; set;}
}