Array that can be accessed using array['Name'] in C#

Question

Can you do

array[\'Name\'];

In C#

Rather than:

array[0];

I know you can do that in PHP but is there a

Answer 1

Arrays don't work like that in C#, but you can add an indexer property to any class:

class MyClass
{
    public string this[string key]
    {
        get { return GetValue(key); }
        set { SetValue(key, value); }
    }
}

Then you can write the type of statements you ask against this:

MyClass c = new MyClass();
c["Name"] = "Bob";

This is how string-based indexed access to Dictionary<TKey, TValue>, NameValueCollection and similar classes are implemented. You can implement multiple indexers as well, for example, one for the index and one for the name, you just add another property as above with a different parameter type.

Several built-in framework classes already have these indexers, including:

• SortedList<TKey, TValue>
• Dictionary<TKey, TValue>
• SortedDictionary<TKey, TValue>
• NameValueCollection
• Lookup<TKey, TValue> (in System.Linq)

...and more. These are all designed for slightly different purposes, so you'll want to read up on each and see which one's appropriate for your requirement.

Answer 2

Dictionary<string, whatyouwanttostorehere> myDic =
                            new Dictionary<string, whatyouwanttostorehere>();
myDic.Add("Name", instanceOfWhatIWantToStore);   
myDic["Name"];

Answer 3

it's called a Dictionary in C#. Using generics you can actually index by any type. Like so:

Dictionary<Person, string> dictionary = new Dictionary<Person, string>();
Person myPerson = new Person(); 
dictionary[myPerson] = "Some String";
...
string someString = dictionary[myPerson];
Console.WriteLine(someString);

This obviously prints, "Some String" to the console.

This is an example of the flexibility of the dictionary. You can do it with a string as an index too, like you asked for.