Implementing INotifyPropertyChanged - does a better way exist?

Question

Microsoft should have implemented something snappy for INotifyPropertyChanged, like in the automatic properties, just specify {get; set; notify;} I

Answer 1

I introduce a Bindable class in my blog at http://timoch.com/blog/2013/08/annoyed-with-inotifypropertychange/ Bindable uses a dictionary as a property bag. It's easy enough to add the necessary overloads for a subclass to manage its own backing field using ref parameters.

• No magic string
• No reflection
• Can be improved to suppress the default dictionary lookup

The code:

public class Bindable : INotifyPropertyChanged {
    private Dictionary _properties = new Dictionary();

    /// 

    /// Gets the value of a property
    /// 
    /// 
    /// 
    /// 
    protected T Get([CallerMemberName] string name = null) {
        Debug.Assert(name != null, "name != null");
        object value = null;
        if (_properties.TryGetValue(name, out value))
            return value == null ? default(T) : (T)value;
        return default(T);
    }

    /// 

    /// Sets the value of a property
    /// 
    /// 
    /// 
    /// 
    /// Use this overload when implicitly naming the property
    protected void Set(T value, [CallerMemberName] string name = null) {
        Debug.Assert(name != null, "name != null");
        if (Equals(value, Get(name)))
            return;
        _properties[name] = value;
        OnPropertyChanged(name);
    }

    public event PropertyChangedEventHandler PropertyChanged;

    protected virtual void OnPropertyChanged([CallerMemberName] string propertyName = null) {
        PropertyChangedEventHandler handler = PropertyChanged;
        if (handler != null) {
            handler(this, new PropertyChangedEventArgs(propertyName));
        }
    }
}

It can be used like this:

public class Contact : Bindable {
    public string FirstName {
        get { return Get(); }
        set { Set(value); }
    }
}