Implementing read-only properties with { get; }

Question

Why doesn\'t this run:

  class Program
  {
    static void Main(string[] args)
    {
      Apple a = new Apple(\"green\");
    }
  }

  class Apple
  {

             


        

Answer 1

I think what you're looking for is this, which keeps your internal variable protected by only exposing a GET to the outside world. For extra safety you could mark _colour as readonly so that it can't be changed within the class itself either (after instantiation), but I think that's overkill. What if your apple gets old and needs to turn brown ?!

class Program
{
    static void Main(string[] args)
    {
        Apple a = new Apple("green");
    }
}

class Apple
{
    private string _colour;
    public string Colour
    {
        get
        {
            return _colour;
        }
    }

    public Apple(string colour)
    {
        this._colour = colour;
    }

}