Reputation: 2864

can int store string value in c#

I am working on the front end of an application. I have to introduce one more filter criteria LoanNumber. Now loan number is E-100. Business layer and domain object is not in my control. So i cannot change it. Domain object which holds loannumber is integer, I have to do

ingeoFilterData.intLoanNumber="E-100"

ingeoFilterData is the domain object. intLoanNumber is declared as Nullable Int32 Now this domainobject is very critical and it goes to some external engine,so i cannot change it.

Please suggest some workaround.

Edit-

I am copying down loannumber from database table.

RT1
RT2
PT1
pt10
PT11
PT12
PT13
PT14
PT15
pt16
pt17
pt8
pt9
MDR1
MDR2
MDR3

Upvotes: 0

Answers (7)

Polyfun

Reputation: 9639

I suggest that you talk to someone in the business/domain layer, or who is responsible for the design of the system, and point out to them that loannumber need to be changed to a string. No one will thank you for bodging your code to get around what is a design flaw--it can only lead to trouble and confusion later.

Upvotes: 0

RameshVel

Reputation: 65877

i think thats possible if you can convert the char into ASCII code.

string --- ASCII

0-10---48-57

A-Z----65-90

a-z----97-122

check out the ASCII table for more info..

Conversion:

so you can convert

RT1 to 082084049

RT2 to 082084050 and

MDR3 to 077068082051

i just prepend 0's to each character if the value is not 3 digit one(because max possible ASCII (z) value is in 3 digits ). R is actually 82, it becomes 082. And the final integer (no of digits) would be in multiples of 3.

Extraction:

This helps to extract the info in the other end. just split this into seperate 3 digit values and convert them to char and append them. you wil get the final string.

082,084,049 - R,T,1. thats all.

p.s: this method may end up in arithmetic overflow problem for large strings

Upvotes: 0

Danail

Reputation: 10583

If you have only one character, you can do this:

multiply your int by 100. (for example E-51 -> 5100)

Then keep the char as int in the rest of the number (for example 5106).

Do the reverse when you need to show the UI id (E-51).

If you have no limitations (as you mentioned) then you can have your int as a protocol (according to me that is even harder because you are limited by Int32 - 4,294,967,296).

You can set your number to something like

<meaning><number><meaning><number>

and meaning is - 1 - number, 2 - letter, 3 - hyphon.

then 11 will mean 1; 201 will mean A, 3 will mean hyphon, and 113201 will mean 1-A;

It's complicated and not very likely to be usable...

This solution limits your id to length of 5 numbers or 3 letters and 1 number. You can squeez some more by using your int bit-wize and optimize your "protocol" as much as possible.

I hope this helps, Danail

Upvotes: 10

Lasse V. Karlsen

Reputation: 391346

Unfortunately at some point, bad design will give you unsolvable problems.

I don't know if this is one of them, but if the domain model has specified that loan numbers are integers, then either you, or the people that made that model clearly hasn't done their job.

Why the E in there? What does it signify? Is it just a prefix, can you remove it when storing it and put it back before displaying it?

Unfortunately, if the prefix can change, so that at some point you will have F-100 and so on, then you need to find a way to encode that into the integer you send to the domain model and business logic.

If you can't do that, you need to find a different place to store that prefix, or possibly the entire code.

If you can't do that, well, then you're screwed.

But to be blunt, this smells badly of someone who has been asleep while designing.

"Yeah, that's a good idea, we'll make the loan identification number an integer. I know somewhere, someplace, that someone has an example of what those loan identification numbers look like, but it's just numbers right? I mean, what could go wrong...?"

Upvotes: 0

Paolo Tedesco

Reputation: 57202

If the "prefix" of the loan number is always "E-" you could just exclude it.
Otherwise maybe you could add a property "LoanNumberPrefix" and store the "E-" in it.

Upvotes: 0