Question

I am making a class that calls a callback function and I want it to pass some data in some cases but that data may vary. In C++ I would use void* but in C# it’s unsafe and it means it might get GCed. Is there any way of passing unknown type of data in C#?

Answer 1

You’ve got two options:

Generics (which allow you to specify the type when you call the method… and the object will be properly typed within the method.)

// Definition:
public void MyMethod<T>(T myParameter)
{
    /* My Code */
}

// Call:
MyMethod<int>(999);

// Call:
MyMethod<bool>(false);

Or System.Object (which means you’ll have to ascertain the object’s actual type inside your method and cast appropriately)

// Definition:
public void MyMethod(Object myParameter)
{
    /* My Code */
}

// Call:
MyMethod(999);

// Call:
MyMethod(false);