How to convert object to object[]

Question

I have an object whose value may be one of several array types like int[] or string[], and I want to convert it to a string[]

Answer 1

.ToArray makes multiple memory allocations in most cases, but there are few ways around it:

object value = new[] { 1, 2.3 };

IList list = value as IList;
string[] strings = new string[list.Count];

for (int i = 0; i < strings.Length; i++)
    strings[i] = Convert.ToString(list[i]);

In most cases that might be a bit overkill and waste of vertical space, so I would use something like the accepted answer with an optional null-conditional operator ? to check if the source is array:

string[] strings = (value as Array)?.Cast