properties without body

Question

Possible Duplicate:
What’s the difference between encapsulating a private member as a property and defining a property without a private member?

In C#, usually when I define a property I declare and implement a single line or more for get and set. e.g.

public bool IsThere
{
   get { return _isThere; }
   set { _isThere = value;}
}

now what does this mean?

public bool IsThere
{
   get;
   set;
}

score 5 · Accepted Answer · edited Oct 18 '12 at 20:43

5

Those are auto-properties. They work the same way as your first example, but allow you to omit the unnecessary source code.

They're best used when there is no longer to your getter/setter methods.

They also allow you to add logic to your getter/setter methods later without breaking any calling code (even though you'll also have to implement the private backing property yourself).

edited Oct 18 '12 at 20:43

TonySalimi

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answered Oct 18 '12 at 20:35

Justin Niessner

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So there is no difference at all? – amit kohan Oct 18 '12 at 20:35
@amitkohan - Behavior-wise, no. – Justin Niessner Oct 18 '12 at 20:36
1

@amitkohan That is correct; However, the shorter version only works for the newer versions of c#. – Yehuda Shapira Oct 18 '12 at 20:37
The difference is that you cannot access the internal backing field of automatic properties. – Olivier Jacot-Descombes Oct 18 '12 at 20:39
@OlivierJacot-Descombes: You can using reflection ;) – myermian Oct 18 '12 at 20:47
@m-y: Yes, you can use `Reflection`. But that's a kind of hacking and not the normal way C# works. – Olivier Jacot-Descombes Oct 18 '12 at 20:54
@m-y: Also it's the responsibility of the compiler; if you make assumptions about what the auto-backed field is named, you may be surprised when using a newer version of .NET or compiler (though unlikely) – Chris Sinclair Oct 18 '12 at 21:04

score 2 · Answer 2 · answered Oct 18 '12 at 20:35

2

It's an Auto-Implemented Property (automatic property).

The C# compiler will automatically create a private field member for the get/set methods to read/write from.

Note that there are limitations to automatic properties (for now). For example, you cannot use modifiers such as readonly, though you can still mark it as private set it isn't quite the same.

answered Oct 18 '12 at 20:35

myermian

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seems like constructor where compiler creates it for you if we don't declare or implement it. right? – amit kohan Oct 18 '12 at 20:38
@amitkohan: Yep. Just another lovely part of the C# compiler. – myermian Oct 18 '12 at 20:41

properties without body

2 Answers2