Question

Is there a programmatic benefit to using a using statement?

Notice the difference between this sample:

using Application.Data;
namespace Application.Web
{
    public class SampleClass
    {
        public void SampleMethod()
        {            
            List<Category> categories = CreateCategoriesData();
            Category expected = categories[0];
            ...
        ...
        }
    }
}

And this one:

namespace Application.Web
{
    public class SampleClass
    {
        public void SampleMethod()
        {            
            List<Data.Category> categories = CreateCategoriesData();
            Data.Category expected = categories[0];
            ...
        ...
        }
    }
}

Answer 1

There is no “programmatic” benefit: once the code is compiled, there is no difference in the generated libraries or executables. It is a matter of preference and sometimes coding standards of your organization. Our company prefers using the using except for rare cases where it is not possible.