Question

I have a couple of classes, all derived from the same base type.

class basetype{}
class TypeA : basetype{}
class TypeB : basetype{}
...

A number of them is stored in a list.

List<basetype> myObjects

As always, each of these types has to be handled differently. Now I have a couple of methods to handle them, and one method that takes the basetype as parameter.

HandleTypes(TypeA obj){}
HandleTypes(TypeB obj){}
HandleTypes(basetype obj)

currently, my HandleAllTypes looks like that:

string name = obj.GetType().Name
switch(name)
{
  case "TypeA":
    return HandleTypes(obj as TypeA);
  case "TypeB":
    return HandleTypes(obj as TypeB);
  ....
}

now this is crap. Is there a way like

HandleTypes(obj ?"as derived type"?)

Searched through MSDN and other sources, found nothing.

Answer 1

How about

HandleTypes( obj as dynamic );

?

---

I’ve used this a couple times when I had to deal with third-party classes. It also can be very helpful when there are a lot of derived classes.

You can easily check whether the handling function is implemented:

try {
   HandleTypes( obj as dynamic )
}
catch( RuntimeBinderException ex ) {
   // not implemented
}