Question

I have a method that is supposed to check whether there is exactly one element in a collection that holds true for some predicate (given as a Func).

public bool ExistsUnique(Func<T, bool> p)
    {
        var tempCol = from i in MyCollection where p(i) select i;  
        return (tempCol.Count() == 1);
    }

The problem with this is that when a second element that also holds true for the predicate
is found (for example two of the same string exists in a collection) the count is still 1. Which means it either overrides the first element or never adds the second because it already exists.

Any ideas as to how I can fix this method?
thx
/Peter

Answer 1

There must be some other problem. I’d suspect your predicate. For example, this returns a count of 2, as expected:

        List<string> MyCollection = new List<string>()
        {
            "hello",
            "hello"
        };
        var tempCol = from i in MyCollection where i == "hello" select i;
        int count = tempCol.Count();

I doubt that it’s the way you’re calling it, either. The following works (returns false):

    static List<string> MyCollection = new List<string>()
        {
            "hello",
            "hello"
        };

    static bool ExistsUnique(Func<string, bool> p)
    {
        var tempCol = from i in MyCollection where p(i) select i;
        return tempCol.Count() == 1;
    }

    static void DoIt()
    {
        bool isUnique = ExistsUnique((s) => s.Equals("hello"));
        Console.WriteLine(isUnique);
    }