Question

How does one cast the return value from CreateInstance when the type is unknown?

For example in this code:

MethodInfo mInfo = typeof(MyType).GetMethod(MethodBase.GetCurrentMethod().Name);
Object o = Activator.CreateInstance(mInfo.ReturnType);

how do I cast my o to whatever mInfo.ReturnType contains?

Answer 1

Casting (at least, in the way you usually mean) is a compile-time / static-typed operation. The only way that even makes sense at runtime with an unknown type is when dealing either with generics (casting it to some T – and note that you can choose the T at runtime via MakeGenericMethod or MakeGenericType), or with meta-programming (emitting IL to do the appropriate cast). In all other cases when the type is unknown until runtime, you are stuck with either object or dynamic.