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 haven't actually had a chance to try this myself yet, but next time I'm setting up a project with a big requirement for INotifyPropertyChanged I'm intending on writing a Postsharp attribute that will inject the code at compile time. Something like:

[NotifiesChange]
public string FirstName { get; set; }

Will become:

private string _firstName;

public string FirstName
{
   get { return _firstname; }
   set
   {
      if (_firstname != value)
      {
          _firstname = value;
          OnPropertyChanged("FirstName")
      }
   }
}

I'm not sure if this will work in practice and I need to sit down and try it out, but I don't see why not. I may need to make it accept some parameters for situations where more than one OnPropertyChanged needs to be triggered (if, for example, I had a FullName property in the class above)

Currently I'm using a custom template in Resharper, but even with that I'm getting fed up of all my properties being so long.

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Ah, a quick Google search (which I should have done before I wrote this) shows that at least one person has done something like this before here. Not exactly what I had in mind, but close enough to show that the theory is good.