reflection on List and printing values

Question

I wrote a method that accepts a generic parameter and then it prints its properties. I use it to test my web service. It\'s working but I want to add some features that I do

Answer 1

I think you want something like this:

public class Program
{
    public static void PrintProperties(T t)
    {
        var properties = t.GetType().GetProperties();

        foreach (var property in properties)
        {
            var name = property.Name;
            var value = property.GetValue(t, null);

            if (property.PropertyType.IsGenericType && property.PropertyType == typeof(IEnumerable<>))
            {
                var formatList = typeof(Program).GetMethod("FormatList", new[] { value.GetType() });

                // value.GetType().GetGenericArguments().First() will get you the underlying type of the list,
                // i.e., the TItemType where the property you are currently
                // handling is of type IEnumerable
                formatList.MakeGenericMethod(value.GetType().GetGenericArguments().First());

                value = formatList.Invoke(null, new object[] { value });

                Console.Out.WriteLine(name + ": " + value);
            }
            else
            {
                Console.Out.WriteLine(name + ": " + value);
            }
        }
    }

    public static string FormatList(IEnumerable l)
    {
        return string.Join(", ", l);
    }
}

The code is untested but basically, you want to tackle enumerable types differently as compared to scalar values, so once you hit something of the type IEnumerable, you make a call to the FormatList method.

Now, bear in mind that your original T and TItemType are not necessarily the same. When you invoke FormatList using reflection, you want to bind the TPlaceholder to TItemType. Once you have done that, you just invoke the formatting method and pass it the actual instance of the list, which returns you a string. That string you can then just output.

Hope that helps.