Question

I never liked implicit operators (prefer extension methods) because it is hard to see visually when that cast/conversion happens in the code.

Imagine if you have example like below:

public static implicit operator Deal(string dealAsXml)
{
    //convert the xml into Deal object
}

Above implicit operator helps you to cast/convert deal in Xml format into Deal Object.

Usually when you right click on a method, you can use “Find Usages” (or Alt+F7) on it, which is quite helpful, is there anything similar for implicit operators ?

I think that’s another reason to use the Extensions methods where possible.

Answer 1

EDIT FROM THE FUTURE: Current versions of Visual Studio let you right-click "Find All References" on implicit operators. Right click on the conversion type (Deal in this example) or operator symbol (+, -, *, /, etc.) to access the "Find All References" command. So the below advice is now [Obsolete]

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Maybe something like Resharper can do it, but I’m not sure. When I need to find usages, I do it the poor-man’s way and remove the implicit operator, recompile and find the errors.

I suppose theoretically the compiler might then miss a case if it can use a different implicit operator (or switch to an "object" type overload of a method), but it tends to work for my usages. I’m sure there’s a better solution, but it’s worked for me so far.

EDIT: Just had a thought and tested it. Marking your implicit operator as [Obsolete] will actually result in a compiler warning wherever you use it! I suppose this will catch those corner cases where there are other valid overloads that you’d miss having removed the implicit operator altogether.