 About C#

 What is C#?
 More C#
 C# in the .NET framework
 Where C# is used?
 Version History
 The Syntax
 “Popular” IDEs

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 Some C# Features
 Object-Orientation
▪ Inheritance
▪ Polymorphism
 Properties
 Delegates
 Anonymous Methods
 Lambda Expressions
 Implicitly Typed Local Variables
C# by Mazin Hakeem 3
 Some C# Features (Continued)
 Object Initializers
 Anonymous Types
 LINQ
 Named Arguments & Optional Parameters
 Conclusion
 References

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C# by Mazin Hakeem 5
 Pronounced: C Sharp
 Called Visual C#, or just C#
 Developed by Microsoft for the .NET
framework initiative
 Is a pure object-oriented programming
language
 Also, a multi-paradigm programming
language (imperative, declarative, functional,
generic, & component oriented) (1)
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 Is safer than C++
 Is type-safe
 No misuse of pointers; must use the “unsafe” mode to
explicitly deal with pointers
 Has a Garbage Collector (GC); Memory management
is implicit
 In the .NET framework, C# is complied into a
binary-based intermediate language, Common
Intermediate Language (CIL), then the
framework converts it to machine code using
Common Language Runtime (CLR) (2 & 3)

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 C# Source File

Compile .NET
C# Compiler
Time Framework

CIL

CLR
Run
Time
Machine Code

(Source: 2 & 3) OS Services

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 Desktop apps
 Websites (w/ ASP .NET)
 Web services
 Mobile phones (WM & WP7)
 DB apps (w/ ADO .NET)
 Distributed components
 UI design [Desktop/Web] (w/ Silverlight)
 … and many more

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 1.0 with .NET 1.0 w/ VSDN 2002 (2002)
 1.2 with .NET 1.1 w/ VSDN 2003 (2003)
 2.0 with .NET 2.0 w/ VSDN 2005 (2005)
 3.0 with .NET 3.5 w/ VSDN 2008 (2007)
 4.0 with .NET 4.0 w/ VSDN 2010 (2010)

 VSDN  Visual Studio .NET

 In each version after 1.2, a lot of new features
were added to the language
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 C# 2.0 (1 & 4)
 Generics
 Partial types
 Anonymous methods
 Iterators
 Nullable types

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 C# 3.0 (1 & 4)
 Implicitly typed local variables
 Object and collection initializers
 Auto-Implemented properties
 Anonymous types
 Extension methods
 Query expressions
 Lambda expressions
 Expression trees

C# by Mazin Hakeem 12
 C# 4.0 (1 & 5 & 6)
 Dynamic binding
 Named and optional arguments
 Generic co- and contravariance

 On the next coming slides, a number of

features introduced in these versions will be
covered

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 Very similar to C++ & Java
Class declaration
Main method

Comments

Variable declaration

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 The result using VSDN 2010
Professional on Windows 7

The same result using Mono on

Ubuntu 10.10 (Linux)

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 C# is mainly used to develop under the .NET
framework environment for MS Windows®
 Mono allowed cross-platform development
 The “popular” IDEs:
 Visual Studio .NET
▪ For Windows XP to 7
▪ Free (limited) version (Express Edition) {since 2005}
▪ Various paid versions (Standard, Pro, Team, etc.)
 Mono
▪ Is open source and free
▪ Cross-platform (Win, Mac, and various Linux distros )
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C# by Mazin Hakeem 17
 Since C# is an object-oriented language, then
all object-oriented concepts are supported
 Abstraction
 Encapsulation
 Inheritance
 Polymorphism

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 C# allows single class inheritance only
 Use colon “ : ”
Class Employee inherits
from class Person

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 To override an inherited method for the
polymorphic behavior, the “override”
keyword must be written within the method
declaration in the inherited class

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 Must declare the function to be overridden in
the base class first
 by using “virtual” keyword for a regular class

 or, by defining an abstract method in an abstract

class

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 Base/Parent Class

Child Class
The overridden behavior

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 Main method

Result

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 “A property is a member that provides a
flexible mechanism to read, write, or
compute the value of a private field” (7)
 Properties act as public data members, but
are methods called “accessors” (7)
 They represent getters and setters
 The private data is not exposed, but
protected
 Provides a layer of abstraction &
encapsulation (2 & 3)
C# by Mazin Hakeem 24
 Property

Access to a property
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 Auto-Implemented Properties (8)
 Introduced in C# 3.0
 Used if there is not much code logic
 No need to define private data members

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 “A delegate can be thought of as an object
containing an ordered list of methods with the
same signature and return type” (2)
 Like C/C++ function pointers, but type-safe
 Declared outside the class structure w/
“delegate” keyword
 No method body
 Methods are passed as parameters;
encapsulated inside the delegate object (9 & 10)
 Mostly used for UI control event handlers (e.g.
Button, Text box, etc.) (similar to Listeners in
Java)
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 Delegate declaration outside the class

Instantiating the delegate and

passing the method
Calling the delegate

The result

(Source: 2 & 11)

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 The concept introduced in C# 2.0
 Also called “Anonymous Delegates” (3 & 12)
 We Declare a method when instantiating a
delegate; “passing a code block as a delegate
parameter” (2 & 13)
 Reduces the creation of a separate method
 Mostly used for a “one time” use of a method
 A bit similar to the “Anonymous Classes”
concept in Java
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 The structure
of an
Anonymous
Method

The result

(Source: 14)
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 Introduced in C# 3.0
 Another kind of “Anonymous Methods”
 Less verbose
 No need to mention the “delegate” keyword
like in the regular “Anonymous Methods”
 Use the lambda operator “=>”; Is read “goes
to” (2)

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 Anonymous Method vs. Lambda Expression
Anonymous
Method
Simplified to

Lambda Expression

A clean version of the

Lambda Expression

 All of them produce the same result

 The last one is more clean, short and readable
(Examples from: 2)

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 Lambda Expression

The result

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 Introduced in C# 3.0
 Variable types are not declared explicitly
 The “var” keyword is used to define variables
 The compiler infers the type from the initialized
statement
 Similar to JavaScript’s “var” variable declaration
 Variable must be initialized & can’t be “null”
 Can’t have more than one type defined
Variable “i” is compiled as type “int”
l
(Source: 14 & 15)

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 Introduced in C# 3.0
 Used when there is no class constructor
 The idea is to assign values to any accessible
property or field at the object’s creation time

Initializing the variable at runtime

(Source: 2 & 16)

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 Introduced in C# 3.0
 The concepts is to create unnamed class types
 Combines the “Object Initializer” concept to
assign values to fields on creation time, & the
“Implicitly Typed Local Variable” concept to let
the compiler infer the variable type
 Anonymous Types are common in LINQ
Anonymous Type which is inferred
as a class by the compiler

(Source: 17)

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 “Language Integrated Query”
 Pronounced “Link”
 An extension for the .NET 3.5 framework
 Introduced in C# 3.0 in VSDN 2008
 Used to query data like DB queries (2)
 Similar to SQL (a.k.a. Query Expression) (18)

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 Data could be represented in any object types
(e.g. arrays, class objects), relational DBs, &
XML
 Also, to manipulate any data source (3)
 Can perform filtering, ordering, grouping, &
joining operations in a few lines of code (19)
 “Anonymous Types” & “Implicitly Typed
Local Variables” concepts are used for the
querying part of the code (Query Expression)
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 The data source (An
array of integers)

The Query
Expression

The result

(Source: 20)
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  Introduced in C# 4.0
 Each is distinct, but useful together
 Used to reduce code & make it easy to code
 Named Arguments
 No need to remember parameters’ positions
 Name the argument with its value using colon “:”

A method w/ arguments

Passing arguments values by explicitly

mentioning their names not in the
(Source: 21)
C# by Mazin Hakeem original order of the actual method 40
 Optional Parameters
 Can omit some arguments when passing to a
method
 No need for method overloads (defining the same
method more than once but w/ different
parameters)
 Default values must be assigned last in the method
S
Declaring the optional argument in the
Omitted an argument (country) method by assigning a default value
(Source: 22)
C# by Mazin Hakeem 41
 Declaring the optional argument in the
method by assigning a default value

Omitting the “country”

argument and passing
arguments values by explicitly
mentioning their names not in
original order

The result

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 C# is an Object-Oriented language
 Is now a cross-platform language
 Lots of features have evolved and added since the 1st
version in 2002
 The programmer can write readable, few lines of code
 Getters & setters are defined in a single “accessor”
method called “Property”
 Provides on-the-fly variable, method, & class creation
 No more method overloads or remembering
arguments positions in a method w/ Named &
Optional Arguments

C# by Mazin Hakeem 43
1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C_Sharp_(programming_language)
2. Illustrated C# 2008, Apress, ISBN: 978-1590599549
3. Beginning C# 2008 from Novice to Professional, Apress, ISBN:
978-1590598696
4. http://en.csharp-online.net/CSharp_Overview
5. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/ff796223.aspx
6. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/vcsharp/ff628440.aspx
7. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/x9fsa0sw.aspx
8. http://www.csharp-station.com/Tutorials/Lesson10.aspx
9. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms173171(v=vs.80).aspx
10. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa288459(v=vs.71).aspx
11. http://www.akadia.com/services/dotnet_delegates_and_events.
html

C# by Mazin Hakeem 44
12. http://www.switchonthecode.com/tutorials/csharp-tutorial-
anonymous-delegates-and-scoping
13. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/0yw3tz5k(v=vs.80).aspx
14. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb384061.aspx
15. http://www.dotnetfunda.com/articles/article631-new-features-
in-csharp-2008-.aspx
16. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb384062.aspx
17. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb397696.aspx
18. Beginning C# 3.0, Wrox, ISBN: 978-0470261293
19. C# in Depth, Manning, ISBN: 1933988363
20. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb397676.aspx
21. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd264739.aspx
22. http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-
us/vcsharp/ff628440.aspx#argsparams

C# by Mazin Hakeem 45