How do I determine if System.Type is a custom type or a Framework type?

Question

I want to distinctly determine if the type that I have is of custom class type (MyClass) or one provided by the Framework (System.String).

Is there any way in refle

Answer 1

If you simply want to distinguish between MyClass and string then you can check for those types directly:

Type typeToTest = GetTypeFromSomewhere();

if (typeToTest == typeof(MyClass))
    MyClassAction();
else if (typeToTest == typeof(string))
    StringAction();
else
    NotMyClassOrString();

If you need a more general check for whether or not a given type is a framework type then you could check whether it belongs to the System namespace:

// create an array of the various public key tokens used by system assemblies
byte[][] systemTokens =
    {
        typeof(System.Object)
            .Assembly.GetName().GetPublicKeyToken(),  // B7 7A 5C 56 19 34 E0 89
        typeof(System.Web.HttpRequest)
            .Assembly.GetName().GetPublicKeyToken(),  // B0 3F 5F 7F 11 D5 0A 3A 
        typeof(System.Workflow.Runtime.WorkflowStatus)
            .Assembly.GetName().GetPublicKeyToken()   // 31 BF 38 56 AD 36 4E 35 
    };

Type typeToTest = GetTypeFromSomewhere();

string ns = typeToTest.Namespace;
byte[] token = typeToTest.Assembly.GetName().GetPublicKeyToken();

bool isSystemType = ((ns == "System") || ns.StartsWith("System."))
                    && systemTokens.Any(t => t.SequenceEqual(token));