Clever way to append 's' for plural form in .Net (syntactic sugar)

Question

I want to be able to type something like:

Console.WriteLine(\"You have {0:life/lives} left.\", player.Lives);

instead of

Consol         


        

Answer 1

With the newfangled interpolated strings, I just use something like this:

// n is the number of connection attempts
Console.WriteLine($"Needed {n} attempt{(n!=1 ? "s" : "")} to connect...");

EDIT: just ran across this answer again--since I originally posted this, I've been using an extension method that makes it even easier. This example is ordered by peculiarity:

static class Extensions {
    /// 

    /// Pluralize: takes a word, inserts a number in front, and makes the word plural if the number is not exactly 1.
    /// 
    /// "{n.Pluralize("maid")} a-milking
    /// The word to make plural
    /// The number of objects
    /// An optional suffix; "s" is the default.
    /// An optional suffix if the count is 1; "" is the default.
    /// Formatted string: "number word[suffix]", pluralSuffix (default "s") only added if the number is not 1, otherwise singularSuffix (default "") added
    internal static string Pluralize(this int number, string word, string pluralSuffix = "s", string singularSuffix = "")
    {
        return $@"{number} {word}{(number != 1 ? pluralSuffix : singularSuffix)}";
    }
}

void Main()
{
    int lords = 0;
    int partridges = 1;
    int geese = 1;
    int ladies = 8;
    Console.WriteLine($@"Have {lords.Pluralize("lord")}, {partridges.Pluralize("partridge")}, {ladies.Pluralize("lad", "ies", "y")}, and {geese.Pluralize("", "geese", "goose")}");
    lords = 1;
    partridges = 2;
    geese = 6;
    ladies = 1;
    Console.WriteLine($@"Have {lords.Pluralize("lord")}, {partridges.Pluralize("partridge")}, {ladies.Pluralize("lad", "ies", "y")}, and {geese.Pluralize("", "geese", "goose")}");
}

(formats are the same). The output is:

Have 0 lords, 1 partridge, 8 ladies, and 1 goose
Have 1 lord, 2 partridges, 1 lady, and 6 geese