Common Coding Problems in C Sharp

Common Coding Problems in C#

Magic Strings and Numbers

When there are hard coded strings in the code like filename to write (ie "log.txt"), check if they are used more than once. if it's more than once it's better to define it on top of the class like

static readonly string LOGNAME = "log.txt";

it's same with the numbers like buffer size.

static readonly int BUFFERSIZE = 250;

About if

wrapping if with curly braces can be ignored if it's one line afterwards. To overcome this problem

either

if (test) Console.WriteLine("it's true");

or

if (test)
{
  Console.WriteLine("it's true");
}

String Concatenation

plus should not be used to concatenate strings like beolw

var s = "This" + " is" + " a" + " string"; 

instead

var s = string.Concat("This", " is", " a" , " string");

or

string.Format("This is {0} a value", v);

When it comes to multiline strings

var x = "this is a line";
x += "And some more line";
x += " and some more"; 

instead

StringBuilder bldr = new  StringBuilder();
bldr.Append("This is a line");
bldr.AppendFormat("Foo Bar {0]", 1);
bldr.AppendLine("");
var result = bldr.ToString;

const vs readonly

const created when app started (actually design time) and readonly created when it's first used (run time). This causes a problem when const is in a library and used in an app. library may not be recompiled thus makes const value inconsistent.

Bad IDisposible usage

for disposible objects like FileStream

FileStream stream = new FileStream()
// .....
stream.Close();
stream.Dispose();

instead

using(FileStream stream = new FileStream())
{
// ......
stream.Close();

Enumaration Initialization

enter first value as 0 in enum like

public enum Position
{
Invalid = 0,
Pitcher,
Catcher , 
....
}

public enum PitcherType
{
Unknown = 0,
Starting = 1,
LongRelief = 2,
....
}

Large method bodies

Normally a method should fit in a normal monitor (upto 60 lines) Name of the method can be seld descriptive. Thus you don't need to write inline comments