Generic static fields initialization

Question

I\'m just getting curious about the following code :

public static class Container
{
    public static readonly T[] EmptyArray = new T[0];
}
         


        

Answer 1

Static field initializers are really moved into the static constructor (type initializer) of the class. So your code compiles into this automagically:

public static class Container
{
    public static readonly T[] EmptyArray;

    static Container()
    {
        EmptyArray = new T[];
    }
}

From MSDN about static constructors:

It [Static Constructor] is called automatically before the first instance is created or any static members are referenced.

Since Container and Container are not the same, the static constructor is called once for each type of T.