Question

I’m writing an application that runs “things” to a schedule.

Idea being that the database contains assembly, method information and also the parameter values. The timer will come along, reflect the method to be run, add the parameters and then execute the method.

Everything is fine except for the parameters.

So, lets say the method accepts an ENUM of CustomerType where CustomerType has two values of CustomerType.Master and CustomerType.Associate.

EDIT
I don’t know the type of parameter that will be getting passed in. ENUM used as an example
END OF EDIT

We want to run Method “X” and pass in parameter “CustomerType.Master”. In the database, there will be a varchar entry of “CustomerType.Master”.

How do I convert the string “CustomerType.Master” into a type of CustomerType with a value of “Master” generically?

Thanks in advance,

Jim

Answer 1

I would think you have 2 major options:

1. Store the type name along with the parameter value and use that to cast things using Type.GetType(string) to resolve the type in question.
2. Standardize all the methods to be called this way to accept an array of strings, and expect the methods to do any necessary casting.

I know you’ve stated that you’re not doing option 1, but it would help things from the standpoint of calling the functions.

Option 2 is the far more ‘generic’ way to handle the situation, assuming all values can be represented by and cast/converted from strings to the appropriate type. Of course, that only helps if you actually have control over the definition of the methods being called.