C# Cookbook
The book is laid out with respect to the types of problems you will solve as you progress through your life as a C# programmer.
C# Cookbook
Chapter 1. Numbers
Recipe 1.1. Determining Approximate Equality Between a Fraction and Floating-Point Value
Recipe 1.2. Converting Degrees to Radians
Recipe 1.3. Converting Radians to Degrees
Recipe 1.4. Using the Bitwise Complement Operator with Various Data Types
Recipe 1.5. Test for an Even or Odd Value
Recipe 1.6. Obtaining the Most- or Least-Significant Bits of a Number
Recipe 1.7. Converting a Number in Another Base to Base10
Recipe 1.8. Determining Whether a String Is a Valid Number
Recipe 1.9. Rounding a Floating-Point Value
Recipe 1.10. Different Rounding Algorithms
Recipe 1.11. Converting Celsius to Fahrenheit
Recipe 1.12. Converting Fahrenheit to Celsius
Recipe 1.13. Safely Performing a Narrowing Numeric Cast
Recipe 1.14. Finding the Length of Any Three Sidesof a Right Triangle
Recipe 1.15. Finding the Angles of a Right Triangle
Chapter 2. Strings and Characters
Recipe 2.1. Determining the Kind of Character
Recipe 2.2. Determining Whether a Character Is Within a Specified Range
Recipe 2.3. Controlling Case Sensitivity when Comparing Two Characters
Recipe 2.4. Finding All Occurrences of a Character Within a String
Recipe 2.5. Finding the Location of All Occurrencesof a String Within Another String
Recipe 2.6. The Poor Man's Tokenizer
Recipe 2.7. Controlling Case Sensitivity when Comparing Two Strings
Recipe 2.8. Comparing a String to the Beginning or End of a Second String
Recipe 2.9. Inserting Text into a String
Recipe 2.10. Removing or Replacing Characters Within a String
Recipe 2.11. Encoding Binary Data as Base64
Recipe 2.12. Decoding a Base64-Encoded Binary
Recipe 2.13. Converting a String Returned as a Byte[ ] Back into a String
Recipe 2.14. Passing a String to a Method that Accepts Only a Byte[ ]
Recipe 2.15. Converting Strings to Their Equivalent Value Type
Recipe 2.16. Formatting Data in Strings
Recipe 2.17. Creating a Delimited String
Recipe 2.18. Extracting Items from a Delimited String
Recipe 2.19. Setting the Maximum Number of Characters a String Can Contain
Recipe 2.20. Iterating Over Each Character in a String
Recipe 2.21. Improving String Comparison Performance
Recipe 2.22. Improving StringBuilder Performance
Recipe 2.23. Pruning Characters from the Headand/or Tail of a String
Chapter 3. Classes and Structures
Recipe 3.1. Creating Union-Type Structures
Recipe 3.2. Allowing a Type to Represent Itself as a String
Recipe 3.3. Converting a String Representation of an Object into an Actual Object
Recipe 3.4. Polymorphism via Concrete or Abstract Base Classes
Recipe 3.5. Making a Type Sortable
Recipe 3.6. Making a Type Searchable
Recipe 3.7. Indirectly Overloading the +=, -=, /=, and *= Operators
Recipe 3.8. Indirectly Overloading the &&, ||, and ?: Operators
Recipe 3.9. Improving the Performance of a Structure's Equals Method
Recipe 3.10. Turning Bits On or Off
Recipe 3.11. Making Error-Free Expressions
Recipe 3.12. Minimizing (Reducing) Your Boolean Logic
Recipe 3.13. Converting Between Simple Types in a Language Agnostic Manner
Recipe 3.14. Determining Whether to Use theCast Operator, the as Operator, or theis Operator
Recipe 3.15. Casting with the as Operator
Recipe 3.16. Determining a Variable's Type with the is Operator
Recipe 3.17. Polymorphism via Interfaces
Recipe 3.18. Calling the Same Method on Multiple Object Types
Recipe 3.19. Adding a Notification Callback Using an Interface
Recipe 3.20. Using Multiple Entry Points toVersion an Application
Recipe 3.21. Preventing the Creation of an Only Partially Initialized Object
Recipe 3.22. Returning Multiple Items from a Method
Recipe 3.23. Parsing Command-Line Parameters
Recipe 3.24. Retrofitting a Class to Interoperate with COM
Recipe 3.25. Initializing a Constant Field at Runtime
Recipe 3.26. Writing Code that Is Compatible with the Widest Range of Managed Languages
Recipe 3.27. Implementing Nested foreach Functionality in a Class
Recipe 3.28. Building Cloneable Classes
Recipe 3.29. Assuring an Object's Disposal
Recipe 3.30. Releasing a COM Object ThroughManaged Code
Recipe 3.31. Creating an Object Cache
Recipe 3.32. The Single Instance Object
Recipe 3.33. Choosing a Serializer
Recipe 3.34. Creating Custom Enumerators
Recipe 3.35. Rolling Back Object Changes
Recipe 3.36. Disposing of Unmanaged Resources
Recipe 3.37. Determining Where Boxing and Unboxing Occur
Chapter 4. Enumerations
Recipe 4.1. Displaying an Enumeration Value as a String
Recipe 4.2. Converting Plain Text to an Equivalent Enumeration Value
Recipe 4.3. Testing for a Valid Enumeration Value
Recipe 4.4. Testing for a Valid Enumeration of Flags
Recipe 4.5. Using Enumerated Members in a Bitmask
Recipe 4.6. Determining Whether One or More Enumeration Flags Are Set
Chapter 5. Exception Handling
Recipe 5.1. Verifying Critical Parameters
Recipe 5.2. Indicating Where Exceptions Originate
Recipe 5.3. Choosing when to Throw a Particular Exception
Recipe 5.4. Handling Derived Exceptions Individually
Recipe 5.5. Assuring Exceptions are Not Lost when Using Finally Blocks
Recipe 5.6. Handling Exceptions Thrown from Methods Invoked via Reflection
Recipe 5.7. Debugging Problems whenLoading an Assembly
Recipe 5.8. HRESULT-Exception Mapping
Recipe 5.9. Handling User-Defined HRESULTs
Recipe 5.10. Preventing Unhandled Exceptions
Recipe 5.11. Displaying Exception Information
Recipe 5.12. Getting to the Root of a Problem Quickly
Recipe 5.13. Creating a New Exception Type
Recipe 5.14. Obtaining a Stack Trace
Recipe 5.15. Breaking on a First Chance Exception
Recipe 5.16. Preventing the Nefarious TypeInitializationException
Recipe 5.17. Handling Exceptions Thrown from an Asynchronous Delegate
Chapter 6. Diagnostics
Recipe 6.1. Controlling Tracing Output inProduction Code
Recipe 6.2. Providing Fine-Grained Control Over Debugging/Tracing Output
Recipe 6.3. Creating Your Own Custom Switch Class
Recipe 6.4. A Custom Trace Class that Outputs Information in an XML Format
Recipe 6.5. Conditionally Compiling Blocks of Code
Recipe 6.6. Determining Whether a Process Has Stopped Responding
Recipe 6.7. Using One or More Event Logs in Your Application
Recipe 6.8. Changing the Maximum Size of a Custom Event Log
Recipe 6.9. Searching Event Log Entries
Recipe 6.10. Watching the Event Log for a Specific Entry
Recipe 6.11. Finding All Sources Belonging to a Specific Event Log
Recipe 6.12. Implementing a Simple Performance Counter
Recipe 6.13. Implementing Performance Counters that Require a Base Counter
Recipe 6.14. Enable/Disable Complex Tracing Code
Chapter 7. Delegates and Events
Recipe 7.1. Controlling when and if a Delegate Fires Within a Multicast Delegate
Recipe 7.2. Obtaining Return Values from Each Delegate in a Multicast Delegate
Recipe 7.3. Handling Exceptions Individually for Each Delegate in a Multicast Delegate
Recipe 7.4. Converting a Synchronous Delegate to an Asynchronous Delegate
Recipe 7.5. Adding Events to a Sealed Class
Recipe 7.6. Passing Specialized Parameters to and from an Event
Recipe 7.7. An Advanced Interface Search Mechanism
Recipe 7.8. An Advanced Member Search Mechanism
Recipe 7.9. Observing Additions and Modifications to a Hashtable
Recipe 7.10. Using the Windows Keyboard Hook
Recipe 7.11. Using Windows Hooks to Manipulate the Mouse
Chapter 8. Regular Expressions
Recipe 8.1. Enumerating Matches
Recipe 8.2. Extracting Groups from a MatchCollection
Recipe 8.3. Verifying the Syntax of a Regular Expression
Recipe 8.4. Quickly Finding Only the Last Match in a String
Recipe 8.5. Replacing Characters or Words in a String
Recipe 8.6. Augmenting the Basic String Replacement Function
Recipe 8.7. A Better Tokenizer
Recipe 8.8. Compiling Regular Expressions
Recipe 8.9. Counting Lines of Text
Recipe 8.10. Returning the Entire Line in Which a Match Is Found
Recipe 8.11. Finding a Particular Occurrence of a Match
Recipe 8.12. Using Common Patterns
Recipe 8.13. Documenting Your Regular Expressions
Chapter 9. Collections
Recipe 9.1. Swapping Two Elements in an Array
Recipe 9.2. Quickly Reversing an Array
Recipe 9.3. Reversing a Two-Dimensional Array
Recipe 9.4. Reversing a Jagged Array
Recipe 9.5. A More Flexible StackTrace Class
Recipe 9.6. Determining the Number of Times an Item Appears in an ArrayList
Recipe 9.7. Retrieving All Instances of a Specific Itemin an ArrayList
Recipe 9.8. Inserting and Removing Items from an Array
Recipe 9.9. Keeping Your ArrayList Sorted
Recipe 9.10. Sorting a Hashtable's Keys and/or Values
Recipe 9.11. Creating a Hashtable with Max and Min Size Boundaries
Recipe 9.12. Creating a Hashtable with Max and Min Value Boundaries
Recipe 9.13. Displaying an Array's Data as a Delimited String
Recipe 9.14. Storing Snapshots of Lists in an Array
Recipe 9.15. Creating a Strongly Typed Collection
Recipe 9.16. Persisting a Collection Between Application Sessions
Chapter 10. Data Structures and Algorithms
Recipe 10.1. Creating a Hash Code for a Data Type
Recipe 10.2. Creating a Priority Queue
Recipe 10.3. Creating a More Versatile Queue
Recipe 10.4. Determining Where Characters or Strings Do Not Balance
Recipe 10.5. Creating a One-to-Many Map (MultiMap)
Recipe 10.6. Creating a Binary Tree
Recipe 10.7. Creating an n-ary Tree
Recipe 10.8. Creating a Set Object
Chapter 11. Filesystem I/O
Recipe 11.1. Creating, Copying, Moving, and Deleting a File
Recipe 11.2. Manipulating File Attributes
Recipe 11.3. Renaming a File
Recipe 11.4. Determining Whether a File Exists
Recipe 11.5. Choosing a Method of Opening a File or Stream for Reading and/or Writing
Recipe 11.6. Randomly Accessing Part of a File
Recipe 11.7. Outputting a Platform-Independent EOL Character
Recipe 11.8. Create, Write to, and Read from a File
Recipe 11.9. Determining Whether a Directory Exists
Recipe 11.10. Creating, Moving, and Deleting a Directory
Recipe 11.11. Manipulating Directory Attributes
Recipe 11.12. Renaming a Directory
Recipe 11.13. Searching for Directories or FilesUsing Wildcards
Recipe 11.14. Obtaining the Directory Tree
Recipe 11.15. Parsing a Path
Recipe 11.16. Parsing Paths in Environment Variables
Recipe 11.17. Verifying a Path
Recipe 11.18. Using a Temporary File in Your Application
Recipe 11.19. Opening a File Stream with just aFile Handle
Recipe 11.20. Write to Multiple Output Files at One Time
Recipe 11.21. Launching and Interacting withConsole Utilities
Recipe 11.22. Locking Subsections of a File
Recipe 11.23. Watching the Filesystem for Specific Changes to One or More Files or Directories
Recipe 11.24. Waiting for an Action to Occurin the Filesystem
Recipe 11.25. Comparing Version Information of Two Executable Modules
Chapter 12. Reflection
Recipe 12.1. Listing Imported Assemblies
Recipe 12.2. Listing Exported Types
Recipe 12.3. Finding Overridden Methods
Recipe 12.4. Finding Members in an Assembly
Recipe 12.5. Finding Members Within an Interface
Recipe 12.6. Obtaining Types Nested Within a Type
Recipe 12.7. Displaying the Inheritance Hierarchy for a Type
Recipe 12.8. Finding the Subclasses of a Type
Recipe 12.9. Finding All Serializable Types Within an Assembly
Recipe 12.10. Controlling Additions to an ArrayList Through Attributes
Recipe 12.11. Filtering Output when Obtaining Members
Recipe 12.12. Dynamically Invoking Members
Chapter 13. Networking
Recipe 13.1. Converting an IP Address to a Hostname
Recipe 13.2. Converting a Hostname to an IP Address
Recipe 13.3. Parsing a URI
Recipe 13.4. Forming an Absolute URI
Recipe 13.5. Handling Web Server Errors
Recipe 13.6. Communicating with a Web Server
Recipe 13.7. Going Through a Proxy
Recipe 13.8. Obtaining the HTML from a URL
Recipe 13.9. Writing a TCP Server
Recipe 13.10. Writing a TCP Client
Recipe 13.11. Simulating Form Execution
Recipe 13.12. Downloading Data from a Server
Recipe 13.13. Using Named Pipes to Communicate
Chapter 14. Security
Recipe 14.1. Controlling Access to Types in aLocal Assembly
Recipe 14.2. Encrypting/Decrypting a String
Recipe 14.3. Encrypting and Decrypting a File
Recipe 14.4. Cleaning Up Cryptography Information
Recipe 14.5. Verifying that a String Is Uncorrupted During Transmission
Recipe 14.6. Wrapping a String Hash for Ease of Use
Recipe 14.7. A Better Random Number Generator
Recipe 14.8. Securely Storing Data
Recipe 14.9. Making a Security Assert Safe
Recipe 14.10. Preventing Malicious Modifications to an Assembly
Recipe 14.11. Verifying that an Assembly Has Been Granted Specific Permissions
Recipe 14.12. Minimizing the Attack Surface of an Assembly
Chapter 15. Threading
Recipe 15.1. Creating Per-Thread Static Fields
Recipe 15.2. Providing Thread Safe Access to Class Members
Recipe 15.3. Preventing Silent Thread Termination
Recipe 15.4. Polling an Asynchronous Delegate
Recipe 15.5. Timing Out an Asynchronous Delegate
Recipe 15.6. Being Notified of the Completionof an Asynchronous Delegate
Recipe 15.7. Waiting for Worker Thread Completion
Recipe 15.8. Synchronizing the Reading and Writingof a Resource Efficiently
Recipe 15.9. Determining Whether a Requestfor a Pooled Thread Will Be Queued
Recipe 15.10. Waiting for All Threads in theThread Pool to Finish
Recipe 15.11. Configuring a Timer
Recipe 15.12. Storing Thread-Specific Data Privately
Chapter 16. Unsafe Code
Recipe 16.1. Controlling Changes to Pointers Passedto Methods
Recipe 16.2. Comparing Pointers
Recipe 16.3. Navigating Arrays
Recipe 16.4. Manipulating a Pointer to a Fixed Array
Recipe 16.5. Returning a Pointer to a Particular Element in an Array
Recipe 16.6. Creating and Using an Array of Pointers
Recipe 16.7. Creating and Using an Array of Pointersto Unknown Types
Recipe 16.8. Switching Unknown Pointer Types
Recipe 16.9. Breaking Up Larger Numbers into Their Equivalent Byte Array Representation
Recipe 16.10. Converting Pointers to a Byte[ ], SByte[ ],or Char[ ] to a String
Chapter 17. XML
Recipe 17.1. Reading and Accessing XML Datain Document Order
Recipe 17.2. Reading XML on the Web
Recipe 17.3. Querying the Contents of an XML Document
Recipe 17.4. Validating XML
Recipe 17.5. Creating an XML Document Programmatically
Recipe 17.6. Detecting Changes to an XML Document
Recipe 17.7. Handling Invalid Characters in anXML String
Recipe 17.8. Transforming XML to HTML
Recipe 17.9. Tearing Apart an XML Document
Recipe 17.10. Putting Together an XML Document
You don't have to be an experienced C# or .NET developer to use this book—it is designed for users of all levels. This book provides solutions to problems that developers face every day as well as some that may come along infrequently.
The recipes are targeted at the real-world developer who needs to solve problems now, not learn lots of theory first before being able to solve the problem. While reference or tutorial books can teach general concepts, they do not generally provide the help you need in solving real-world problems.
We chose to teach by example, the natural way for most people to learn.
The majority of the problems addressed in this book are frequently faced by C# developers, but some of the more advanced problems call for more intricate solutions that combine many techniques. Each recipe is designed to help you quickly understand the problem, learn how to solve it, and find out any potential tradeoffs or ramifications to help you solve your problems quickly, efficiently, and with minimal effort.