Difference between Task and async Task

Question

C# provides two ways of creating asynchronous methods:

Task():

static Task<         


        

Answer 1

await is basically a shorthand for the continuation, by default using the same synchronization context for the continuation.

For very simple examples like yours, there's not much benefit in using await - although the wrapping and unwrapping of exceptions makes for a more consistent approach.

When you've got more complicated code, however, async makes a huge difference. Imagine you wanted:

static async Task> MyAsync() {
    List results = new List();
    // One at a time, but each asynchronously...
    for (int i = 0; i < 10; i++) {
        // Or use LINQ, with rather a lot of care :)
        results.Add(await SomeMethodReturningString(i));
    }
    return results;
}

... that gets much hairier with manual continuations.

Additionally, async/await can work with types other than Task/Task so long as they implement the appropriate pattern.

It's worth reading up more about what it's doing behind the scenes. You might want to start with MSDN.