Question

I have ToggleActive in C#, and, normally I can call it like ToggleActive where Person is a link 2 sql object in MyProject.Data namespace.

How can I do something like this: ToggleActive<“MyProject.Data.Person”>? Is something like that possible? Do I use typeof somehow?

Thanks!

UPDATE – let me reword this whole thing. I have an admin site, where users can click “delete” for multiple records from different linq to sql tables.

Html…

<table class="persons">
    <tr><td>Eric Davis</td><td><a href="/person/delete/14">delete</a></td></tr>
    <tr><td>Tamara Davis</td><td><a href="/person/delete/15">delete</a></td></tr>
</table>

<table class="orders">
    <tr><td>PB & J Sandwich</td><td><a href="/order/delete/6442">delete</a></td></tr>
    <tr><td>Brat Sandwich</td><td><a href="/order/delete/6443">delete</a></td></tr>
</table>

Route in PersonController…

public ActionResult Delete(int id)
{
    var repository = new MyLinq2SqlRepository();
    repository.DeleteRecord<MyProject.Data.Person>; // MyProject.Data.Person is a linq to sql type
    return redirect("~/"); // return home view
}

Route in OrderController…

public ActionResult Delete(int id)
{
    var repository = new MyLinq2SqlRepository();
    repository.DeleteRecord<Order>; // this is the only thing different from above action
    return redirect("~/"); // return home view
}

What I want in new, ObjectController…

public ActionResult Delete(int id, string type) {
    var repository = new MyLinq2SqlRepository();
    Type linq2SqlType = Type.GetType(type); // where type = "MyProject.Data.Person" or "MyProject.Data.Order"
    repository.DeleteRecord<linq2SqlType>(id);
    return redirect("~/");
}

This way I can have for the tables…

<table class="persons">
    <tr><td>Eric Davis</td><td><a href="/object/delete/14/MyProject.Data.Person">delete</a></td></tr>
    <tr><td>Tamara Davis</td><td><a href="/object/delete/15/MyProject.Data.Person">delete</a></td></tr>
</table>

And the Order table would look very similar, but the links would look like this:

<a href="/object/delete/6442/MyProject.Data.Order">delete</a>

Hopefully that’s more clear as to what I’m trying to do! A way to combine those route actions into one.

---

UPDATE: this is how I eventually ended up doing it…

Html…

<table typeName="@typeof(MyProject.Data.Person)">
@foreach (var p in this.Model.Persons) {
    <tr id="@p.PersonId"><td>@p.FirstName</td><td><a href="#" class="deleteObjLink">delete</a></td></tr>
}
</table>

JS/Ajax…

$(".deleteObjLink").on('click', function(e) {
    e.preventDefault();
    var link = $(this);
    var id = link.closest("tr").attr("id");
    var typeName = link.closest("table").attr("typeName");
    $.ajax({
        url: '/object/delete', type: 'post', 
        data: JSON.stringify({ id: id, typeName = typeName }), 
        contentType: 'application/json',
        successFunc
    });
});

In MVC Object controller…

[HttpPost]    
public JsonResult Delete(int id, string typeName)
{
    Assembly asm = typeof(MyProject.Data.Order).Assembly; // get assembly of any object w/in MyProject.Data.Order namespace (NS). all obj's in that NS share the same assembly
    Type targetEntityType = asm.GetType(typeName);
    MethodInfo genericMethodDefinition = typeof(MyRepository).GetMethod("Delete");
    MethodInfo genericMethod = genericMethodDefinition.MakeGenericMethod(targetEntityType);
    bool success = (bool)genericMethod.Invoke(myRepo, new object[] { id });

    return this.Json(new { Success = success }, JsonRequestBehavior.DenyGet);
}

MyRepository class has Delete(int id) method.

Answer 1

If you’re trying to use reflection to construct this, you’d need to use Type.MakeGenericType to compose the appropriate type.

This would look something like:

string typeName = "MyProject.Data.Person";
Type toggleActiveType = typeof(ToggleActive<>);
Type[] typeArgs = new[]{ Type.GetType(typeName) };

Type fullyDefinedType = toggleActiveType.MakeGenericType(typeArgs);

// Use fullyDefinedType as needed

---

Edit:

Given your edit, the goal is to call a generic method, not make a generic type. This is done via MethodInfo.MakeGenericMethod, like so:

var repository = new MyLinq2SqlRepository();
string typeName = "MyProject.Data.Person";
var mi = repository.GetType().GetMethod("DeleteRecord");
var fullyDefinedMethod = mi.MakeGenericMethod(Type.GetType(typeName));

object[] parameters = new[] { id };
fullyDefinedMethod.Invoke(repository, parameters);