Is there a difference between return myVar vs. return (myVar)?

Question

I was looking at some example C# code, and noticed that one example wrapped the return in ()\'s.

I\'ve always just done:

return myRV;

Answer 1

There are corner cases when presence of parentheses can have effect on the program behavior:

1.

using System;

class A
{
    static void Foo(string x, Action y) { Console.WriteLine(1); }
    static void Foo(object x, Func, int> y) { Console.WriteLine(2); }

    static void Main()
    {
        Foo(null, x => x()); // Prints 1
        Foo(null, x => (x())); // Prints 2
    }
}

2.

using System;

class A
{
    public A Select(Func f)
    {
        Console.WriteLine(1);
        return new A();
    }

    public A Where(Func f)
    {
        return new A();
    }

    static void Main()
    {
        object x;
        x = from y in new A() where true select (y); // Prints 1
        x = from y in new A() where true select y; // Prints nothing
    }
}

3.

using System;

class Program
{
    static void Main()
    {
        Bar(x => (x).Foo(), ""); // Prints 1
        Bar(x => ((x).Foo)(), ""); // Prints 2
    }

    static void Bar(Action> x, string y) { Console.WriteLine(1); }
    static void Bar(Action> x, object y) { Console.WriteLine(2); }
}

static class B
{
    public static void Foo(this object x) { }
}

class C
{
    public T Foo;
}

Hope you will never see this in practice.