Defining two dimensional Dynamic Array with different types

Question

I want to create two dimension array of different type like I can add to that array two values one of them is controlname and second is boolean value.

Answer 1

You can't do that. Instead, you should create a class that contains these two properties, then you can create an array of that type:

public class MyClass
{
    public string ControlName {get;set;}
    public bool MyBooleanValue {get;set;}
}

public MyClass[] myValues=new MyClass[numberOfItems];

Or, as Anders says, use a dictionary if one of the properties is meant to be used to perform lookups.

Answer 2

A dictionary will work for what you are trying to do then.

Dictionary<string, bool> controllerDictionary = new Dictionary<string, bool>();

To set a value

if (controllerDictionary.ContainsKey(controllerName))
    controllerDictionary[controllerName] = newValue;
else
    controllerDictionary.Add(controllerName, newValue);

To get a value

if (controllerDictionary.ContainsKey(controllerName))
    return controllerDictionary[controllerName];
else
    //return default or throw exception

Answer 3

You can't to that with an array.

Perhaps you should be using a Dictionary?

A generic dictionary of Dictionary<string,bool> appears to be the kind of thing that will work for your description.

Answer 4

It depends on how you want to use your array. Do you want to look up the value by a key, or by its index? Konamiman suggested a class. But a class with two types is nothing more than a Dictionary<type of key, type of value>. You can use a dictionary if you want to obtain the value by a key. Like so:

Dictionary<string, int> MyDict = new Dictionary<string, int>();
MyDict.Add("Brutus", 16);
MyDict.Add("Angelina", 22);
int AgeOfAngelina = MyDict["Angelina"];

Now the disadvantage of a dictionary is that, you can't iterate over it. The order is undetermined. You can not use MyDict[0].Value to obtain the age of Brutus (which is 16).

You could use a

List<KeyValuePair<string, int>> MyList = new List<KeyValuePair<string, int>>();

to iterate through a 2D array of two different types as a List supports iteration. But then again, you cannot obtain the age of Angelina by MyList["Angelina"].Value but you would have to use MyList[0].Value.

But you could use a datatable as well. But it requires somewhat more work to initialize the table with its columns.

Answer 5

Another way of doing it is to create an array of type object, and then add this to an arraylist. Here is some sample code:

    using System;
    using System.Collections.Generic;
    using System.Linq;
    using System.Text;
    using System.Threading.Tasks;
    using System.Collections;
    using System.Collections.Generic;

    namespace Collections
    {
        class Program
        {
            static void Main(string[] args)
            {
                ArrayList ar = new ArrayList();
                object[] o = new object[3];
                // Add 10 items to arraylist
                for (int i = 0; i < 10; i++)
                {
                    // Create some sample data to add to array of objects of different types.
                    Random r = new Random();
                    o[0] = r.Next(1, 100);
                    o[1] = "a" + r.Next(1,100).ToString();
                    o[2] = r.Next(1,100);
                    ar.Add(o);
                }
            }
        }
    }

Answer 6

If you want to lookup/set a boolean by control name, you could use a Dictionary<string, bool>.

Answer 7

Use Dictionary<string,bool>. If, for some reason, you really need an array, try object[,] and cast its values to the types you want.

Answer 8

"A multi-dimensional array is an array: all elementsin all dimensions have the same type"

Answer 9

Actually you can do it with a List. I suggest you take a look at Tuples.
How to easily initialize a list of Tuples?

You can use a list of type object too if you want

Like so :

List<List<object>> Dates = new List<List<object>>() { };
Dates.Add(new List<object>() { 0 ,"January 1st" });