C#: Getting maximum and minimum values of arbitrary properties of all items in a list

Question

I have a specialized list that holds items of type IThing:

public class ThingList : IList
{...}

public interface IThing
{
    Decimal         


        

Answer 1

Here's an attempt, using C# 2.0, at Skilwz's idea.

public delegate T GetPropertyValueDelegate(IThing t);

public T GetMaximum(GetPropertyValueDelegate getter)
    where T : IComparable
{
    if (this.Count == 0) return default(T);

    T max = getter(this[0]);
    for (int i = 1; i < this.Count; i++)
    {
        T ti = getter(this[i]);
        if (max.CompareTo(ti) < 0) max = ti;
    }
    return max;
}

You'd use it like this:

ThingList list;
Decimal maxWeight = list.GetMaximum(delegate(IThing t) { return t.Weight; });