Question

Is there a way in c# to have an array of multiple variables?

for instance, I have data for a stock:

Date |Open |High |Low |Close

10-01-2012| 10.00| 11.01| 9.56| 10.56

10-02-2012| 10.56| 10.99| 9.21| 9.99

10-03-2012| 9.99 | 10.12| 9.78| 10.11

---

What I would like to do, is create an array which takes a DateTime and a String variable, and outputs a double/string.

So, if I wanted to get the Open price of the stock on 10-01-2012, I could say

DateTime Day = Convert.ToDateTime(“10-01-2012″);
double openPrice = MyArray[Day,”Open”];

and it would return 10.00, as either a double or a string.

What is the best way to do this? Is this even possible with an array? If not, what other methods can I use? I have been thinking about this for a while, and I’m not sure the best way to structure this array/object

Thanks for any help!

Answer 1

Possibly better to make a single class to contain your data, and create an array or List of those;

class DailyPrice
{
    DateTime Date { get; set; }
    decimal Open { get; set; }
    decimal Close { get; set; }
    decimal High { get; set; }
    decimal Low { get; set; }
}


static class Program
{
    static void Main()
    {
        List<DailyPrice> prices = new List<DailyPrice>();
        prices.Add(new DailyPrice() { Date = DateTime.Today, Open = 11.11M, Close=... });
        prices.Add(new DailyPrice() { Date = DateTime.Today, Open = 12.14M, High=... });
        ...
    }
}

Incidentally, due to precision problems when performing arithmetic with the double type in C#, it’s safer to user decimal for monetary values (which I assume is what you have here).