pre-defined constants for non-trivial data types

Question

My Goal: Create a C# class for predefined errors that have both an ID and a Message. Here was what I tried:

public class MyError
{
    public static readonly         


        

Answer 1

I would create a class that

• is sealed, to prevent it from being inherited
• has a private constructor, to prevent it from being instantiated from outside of the class
• provides properties with private setters, so they cannot be set from outside.

That would give you the following code:

public sealed class MyError
{
    public static readonly MyError OK = new MyError(0, "OK");

    public static readonly MyError Bad = new MyError(1, "Bad Stuff");

    private MyError(int id, string message)
    {
        this.ID = id;
        this.Message = message;
    }

    public int ID { get; private set; }

    public string Message { get; private set; }
}