Dictionary w/ List of Generic Action<T> delegates as Value

[eric]

I'm trying to define a dictionary whose value is an Generic Action<>
delegate

private Dictionary<string, List<Action<T>>>

Any ideas on to how specify T or a different collection type more suitable
to this?

Thanks

[Marc Gravell]

What is the use-case here? What do you want to do with it? For example,
a plain Action might suffice, using the delegate's target for the
instance (perhaps via a closure)?

Marc

[Peter Duniho]

On Tue, 01 Jul 2008 09:56:49 -0700, eric <7ak@!_df.comwrote:

I'm trying to define a dictionary whose value is an Generic Action<>
delegate

Then rather than what you posted:

private Dictionary<string, List<Action<T>>>

You would use:

Dictionary<string, Action<T>>

Where "T" is of course an actual type, assuming you want to declare a
concrete version of the generic Dictionary.

Any ideas on to how specify T or a different collection type more
suitable
to this?

Meaning what? You "specify T" by putting a valid concrete type in for the
generic type parameter. If that doesn't answer your question, I think you
need to rephrase the question so that you're more clear about what you're
actually trying to accomplish.

Pete

[eric]

Sorry,
I'm trying to postpone the concrete type definition until runtime and I
do want a List<Action<T>of generic delegates for every key in the
dictionary.

"Peter Duniho" <Np*********@nnowslpianmk.comwrote in message
news:op***************@petes-computer.local...

On Tue, 01 Jul 2008 09:56:49 -0700, eric <7ak@!_df.comwrote:

>I'm trying to define a dictionary whose value is an Generic Action<>
delegate

Then rather than what you posted:

>private Dictionary<string, List<Action<T>>>

You would use:

Dictionary<string, Action<T>>

Where "T" is of course an actual type, assuming you want to declare a
concrete version of the generic Dictionary.

>Any ideas on to how specify T or a different collection type more
suitable
to this?

Meaning what? You "specify T" by putting a valid concrete type in for the
generic type parameter. If that doesn't answer your question, I think you
need to rephrase the question so that you're more clear about what you're
actually trying to accomplish.

Pete

[Marc Gravell]

Note that Action<T>, as a multicast delegate, can already support
multiple delegates per instance. Re the generics - what is the
difficulty? If the T is only known at runtime, then you'll need to use
reflection and MakeGenericType() or MakeGenericMethod() - but if there
*is* no appropriate T you might have to use "object" or something
comparable.

Marc

[Jon Skeet [C# MVP]]

eric <7ak@!_df.comwrote:

I'm trying to postpone the concrete type definition until runtime and I
do want a List<Action<T>of generic delegates for every key in the
dictionary.

As Marc said, you can probably just use a multi-cast delegate to avoid
needing a List.

However, the point about generics is to give you *compile-time* safety.
If you won't know the type at compile time, other than that it's a
delegate, you should probably just make it a
Dictionary<string,Delegate>

--
Jon Skeet - <sk***@pobox.com>
Web site: http://www.pobox.com/~skeet
Blog: http://www.msmvps.com/jon_skeet
C# in Depth: http://csharpindepth.com

[eric]

I swapped out the Dictionary for Hashtable and that was able to give me what
I was after.

Thanks to all for the help.

"Jon Skeet [C# MVP]" <sk***@pobox.comwrote in message
news:MP*********************@msnews.microsoft.com. ..

eric <7ak@!_df.comwrote:

> I'm trying to postpone the concrete type definition until runtime and
I
do want a List<Action<T>of generic delegates for every key in the
dictionary.

As Marc said, you can probably just use a multi-cast delegate to avoid
needing a List.

However, the point about generics is to give you *compile-time* safety.
If you won't know the type at compile time, other than that it's a
delegate, you should probably just make it a
Dictionary<string,Delegate>

--
Jon Skeet - <sk***@pobox.com>
Web site: http://www.pobox.com/~skeet
Blog: http://www.msmvps.com/jon_skeet
C# in Depth: http://csharpindepth.com

[Jon Skeet [C# MVP]]

eric <7ak@!_df.comwrote:

I swapped out the Dictionary for Hashtable and that was able to give me what
I was after.

Well that's just going completely nongeneric.

Why not use Dictionary<string,Delegate- that at least gives you
*some* safety...

--
Jon Skeet - <sk***@pobox.com>
Web site: http://www.pobox.com/~skeet
Blog: http://www.msmvps.com/jon_skeet
C# in Depth: http://csharpindepth.com

[eric]

I couldn't make Delegate work with Action<T>. I was really trying to
implement something where
I didn't need to know about a specific delegate type. The end result is
really not as nongeneric in the untype-safe sense as you might think.

"Jon Skeet [C# MVP]" <sk***@pobox.comwrote in message
news:MP*********************@msnews.microsoft.com. ..

eric <7ak@!_df.comwrote:

>I swapped out the Dictionary for Hashtable and that was able to give me
what
I was after.

Well that's just going completely nongeneric.

Why not use Dictionary<string,Delegate- that at least gives you
*some* safety...

--
Jon Skeet - <sk***@pobox.com>
Web site: http://www.pobox.com/~skeet
Blog: http://www.msmvps.com/jon_skeet
C# in Depth: http://csharpindepth.com

[Jon Skeet [C# MVP]]

eric <7ak@!_df.comwrote:

I couldn't make Delegate work with Action<T>. I was really trying to
implement something where
I didn't need to know about a specific delegate type.

Which is why you'd need Delegate instead of Action<T>. Then just invoke
it dynamically, which I suspect is what you're having to do anyway.

The end result is really not as nongeneric in the untype-safe sense
as you might think.

You're using Hashtable, which is completely nongeneric and untypesafe.

--
Jon Skeet - <sk***@pobox.com>
Web site: http://www.pobox.com/~skeet
Blog: http://www.msmvps.com/jon_skeet
C# in Depth: http://csharpindepth.com