Question

I’m trying to create a function to parse out all values in a multidimensional Array with all but one dimension given. The details are not relevant, but for this function I need to return an one-dimensional Array containing values of the same type the original multidimensional Array has.

To pass any Array with any dimension to my function, I declared the type of this parameter as Array. However, how would I create a new Array of that specific type (e.g. Integer)?

Currently I have the following code:

Function GetRow(ByVal arr As Array) As Array
    Dim result As (...) 'This should be Integer() if arr contains Integers, etc.
    Return result
End Function

How do I declare the type of result to make it having the same type of values as arr? New Array is not possible as it is declared MustInherit.

Answer 1

Use generics here so the function can handle any type:

Function GetRow(Of T)(ByVal arr() As T) As T()
    Dim result() As T
    ReDim result(arr.Length - 1)
    Array.Copy(arr, result, arr.Length)
    Return result
End Function

Sample usage:

    Dim iarr() As Integer = {1, 2, 3, 4}
    Dim copy = GetRow(iarr)