Generic Type in constructor

Question

I have a Generic Type Interface and want a constructor of an object to take in the Generic Interface.
Like:

public Constructor(int blah, IGenericType<         


        

Answer 1

You can't make constructors generic, but you can use a generic static method instead:

public static Constructor CreateInstance(int blah, IGenericType instance)

and then do whatever you need to after the constructor, if required. Another alternative in some cases might be to introduce a non-generic interface which the generic interface extends.

EDIT: As per the comments...

If you want to save the argument into the newly created object, and you want to do so in a strongly typed way, then the type must be generic as well.

At that point the constructor problem goes away, but you may want to keep a static generic method anyway in a non-generic type: so you can take advantage of type inference:

public static class Foo
{
    public static Foo CreateInstance(IGenericType instance)
    {
        return new Foo(instance);
    }
}

public class Foo
{
    public Foo(IGenericType instance)
    {
        // Whatever
    }
}

...

IGenericType x = new GenericType();
Foo noInference = new Foo(x);
Foo withInference = Foo.CreateInstance(x);