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c#genericsinheritance.net-3.5
Yatrix
Yatrix

Reputation: 13785

Generics: I'm not quite sure what the <T> does - can you explain?

I'm creating an abstract class to derive from. I have a Value property that can be numerous data types. I saw an article on generics and I'm just wondering if my understanding is correct.

Does having an abstract: 

BaseClass<T>

and inheriting it like:

InheritingClass: BaseClass<int>

basically equate to: anywhere there is a type T defined in BaseClass , treat it as a type int when used through InheritingClass?

That is my understanding and I just want to make sure that is correct before I build the rest of these classes and find out I was way off. This is the first time I've used generics.

Upvotes: 0

Views: 110

Answers (3)

Kevin Aenmey
Kevin Aenmey

Reputation: 13419

anywhere there is a type T in InheritingClass , treat it as a type int

As already mentioned by @BoltClock, this is not the case. I wonder, however, if you meant to say:

anywhere there is a type T in BaseClass, treat it as a type int

If this is what you meant, then you are indeed correct.

Upvotes: 2

BoltClock
BoltClock

Reputation: 724132

No, it does not; it means your class specifically only inherits from BaseClass<int>. If you define a generic type parameter T in your InheritingClass, like this:

InheritingClass<T> : BaseClass<int>

Then that type parameter pertains only to InheritingClass and its own members, and does not apply to BaseClass in any way. Neither does T in InheritingClass automatically resolve to int due to the parentage. In other words, the two type parameters are independent of each other.

Upvotes: 5

James
James

Reputation: 710

Generics are for having type-safe classes that can be easily customized to be used with any type. The "T" is a placeholder for the type you want to use with that class.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms379564(v=vs.80).aspx

"Generics allow you to define type-safe data structures, without committing to actual data types."

Upvotes: 0

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