Dictionary vs. Array

[Ben Enfield]

I have an application where the data access portion will return a value based
on the enum type month passed to it. I was wondering if this should be done
with a hash map (dictionary) or an ordinary Array with the index numbers.

Answers can come be direct, or simple links to data access explanations on
websites or even references to good books about data access and the reason to
use different data types in different situations.

I appreciate any help given or attempted, even if it is simply criticism of
other, unrelated parts of my code.

using System;
using System.Collecti ons.Generic;
using System.Text;
using System.IO;

namespace Data_Access_for _Jackson_Projec t
{
public class STXXXXInput
{
/// <summary>
/// number of rows in the dat file, or the number of individually
corrilated portions
/// of the year.
/// </summary>
static int ST3A = 14;

/// <summary>
/// The number of coefficients + the indexing variable.
/// </summary>
static int ST3B = 5;
double[,] ST3Coefficients = new double[ST3A,ST3B];

public STXXXXInput(str ing location)
{
StreamReader SR = new StreamReader("S T3-2003.dat");

SR.BaseStream.S eek(0, SeekOrigin.Begi n);

char delimeter = ' ';

for (int i = 0; i < ST3A; i++)
{
string[] temp = SR.ReadLine().S plit(delimeter) ;
int j = 0;
int k = 0;
while (j < ST3B)
{
foreach (string s in temp)
{
if (temp[k] != "")
{
ST3Coefficients[i, j] = Convert.ToDoubl e(s);
j++;
}
k++;
}
}
}
}

/// <summary>
/// The time of the flowperiod in the year.
/// </summary>
public enum FlowPeriod : int
{
July = 0,
August = 1,
September1_15 = 2,
September16_30 = 3,
October1_15 = 4,
October16_31 = 5,
November = 6,
December = 7,
January =8,
February = 9,
March = 10,
April = 11,
May = 12,
June = 13
}

/// <summary>
/// Returns the state 3 coefficients along with what type of fit
they describe
/// </summary>
/// <param name="period"></param>
/// <returns></returns>
public double[] GetST3Coefficie nts(FlowPeriod period)
{
double[] periodST3Coeff = new double[ST3B];

for (int i= 0; i < ST3B; i++)
periodST3Coeff[i] = ST3Coefficients[(int)period, i];
return periodST3Coeff;
}
}
}

[Daniel O'Connell [C# MVP]]

"Ben Enfield" <Be********@dis cussions.micros oft.com> wrote in message
news:E3******** *************** ***********@mic rosoft.com...

I have an application where the data access portion will return a value
based
on the enum type month passed to it. I was wondering if this should be
done
with a hash map (dictionary) or an ordinary Array with the index numbers.

I would go with direct array indexes as long as the enum won't change. If
the enum might change to the point where you won't have sequential values,
go with a dictionary.

[Ben Enfield]

Thank you for using your time to overview my code

"Daniel O'Connell [C# MVP]" wrote:

"Ben Enfield" <Be********@dis cussions.micros oft.com> wrote in message
news:E3******** *************** ***********@mic rosoft.com...

I have an application where the data access portion will return a value
based
on the enum type month passed to it. I was wondering if this should be
done
with a hash map (dictionary) or an ordinary Array with the index numbers.

I would go with direct array indexes as long as the enum won't change. If
the enum might change to the point where you won't have sequential values,
go with a dictionary.