Forbid public Add and Delete for a List

Question

in my C#-project, I have a class which contains a List

public class MyClass
{
  public MyClass parent;
  public List children;
  ...
}


        

Answer 1

Beside of implementing your own IList<T> you could return a ReadOnlyCollection<MyClass>.

public MyClass
{
    public MyClass Parent;

    private List<MyClass> children;
    public ReadOnlyCollection<MyClass> Children
    {
        get { return children.AsReadOnly(); }
    }
}

Answer 2

You can encapsulate the list in the class by making it private, and offer it as a ReadOnlyCollection:

public class MyClass {

  public MyClass Parent { get; private set; };

  private List<MyClass> _children;

  public ReadOnlyCollection<MyClass> Children {
    get { return _children.AsReadOnly(); }
  }

  public void AddChild(MyClass item) {
    item.Parent = this;
    _children.Add(item);
  }

  public void DeleteChild(MyClass item) {
    item.Parent = null;
    _children.Remove(item);
  }

}

You can make the Parent a property with a private setter, that way it can't be modified from the outside, but the AddChild and DeleteChild methods can change it.