Splitting a C++/CLI property’s definition and implementation into separate cpp/header files

I got asked this in one of my article forums, and thought I’d blog about it here so I can just direct people to a single URL if the question comes up again. Here’s how you’d do it (I used the example property the OP used):

//The header file

ref class Test
{
public:
  property Byte default[int]
  {
    Byte get(int index);
    void set(int index, Byte value);
  }

  //...
};

//The cpp file

Byte Test::default::get(int index)
{
  return 0;
}

void Test::default::set(int index, Byte value)
{
}

//...

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Generic arrays and casting to an object array

This question was posted recently on the CodeProject forums. The OP wanted to know why this code would not compile (I’ve simplified it):

private void FooInternal(object[] values)
{
}

private void Foo<T>(T[] values)
{
    FooInternal(values);
}

The error thrown is:

Error	2	Argument 1: cannot convert from 'T[]' to 'object[]'

The fix is to add a constraint:

private void Foo<T>(T[] values) where T:class
{
    FooInternal(values);
}

If you are wondering why that is needed, consider this code snippet:

struct S
{
}

static void Main(string[] args)
{
    object[] arr = new S[10];
}

That won’t compile either. The reason’s that each of those value type members need to be boxed into an object to get an object array, meaning it’s now a different array. Since that is not standard behavior for casts, the compiler will not automatically do that for you (which is a good thing). If you did it manually, this is what it’d look like:

object[] arr = new S[10].Cast<object>().ToArray();

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