Chapters 4 and 5 of the book have now been made available for early access.

Chapter 4 – Saying nothing with nullable types

Nullable types depend heavily on generics (described in chapter 3) and require both language and runtime changes. In this chapter I explore the problem they solve, the types involved (including runtime changes) and the C# changes (int? meaning Nullable<int> and the various operators and conversions available). I also cover a couple of uses of nullable types which haven’t necessarily hit the mainstream, but can prove useful – the comparisons I wrote about in this blog a little while ago, and using nullable types as an alternative to out parameters for the TryXXX pattern.

Chapter 5 – Fast-tracked delegates

C# 3 relies on delegates a lot. You can’t do any real LINQ work without them. C# 2 laid a lot of the groundwork for the lambda expressions available in C# 2 when it introduced anonymous methods. There are other changes in C# 2 which improve delegates, however – and there are more methods in the .NET 2.0 framework which take advantage of delegates than there were in .NET 1.1. (I’m thinking particularly of List<T>.)

I cover all the improvements in this chapter, but most of the chatper is given over to anonymous methods, and the handling of captured variables in particular. Without wishing to sound like a spoilsport, the use of captured variables can look like magic. Captured variables are still just as useful when the magic is explained away, and they’re somewhat less scary!

More chapters to come soon, I expect – when chapters 6 and 7 are released, that will cover the whole of C# 2.