Question

I have just discovered that best practise instructs that where any type implement iDisposable, then you should wrap that in a using statement to ensure the object is disposed of correctly, even in the event of an exception.

My question is, how can you easily tell which objects implement iDisposable? Or should I just wrap everything that I am unsure about in the using statement and then rely on the compiler to tell me at compile time?

Thanks.

Answer 1

You could …

• Look for the presence of a Dispose member
• Look at the definition of your type (F12)
• Do as you suggest, wrap in a using and see what the compiler says

Although, the best thing is to learn what IDisposable is used for, soon you will understand the types that do and should implement this interface. i.e. external resources, unmanaged type wrappers (GDI graphics objects for example), limited resources (database connections)