How do I use reflection to call a generic method?

Question

What's the best way to call a generic method when the type parameter isn't known at compile time, but instead is obtained dynamically at runtime?

Consider the following sample code - inside the Example() method, what's the most concise way to invoke GenericMethod<T>() using the Type stored in the myType variable?

public class Sample
{
    public void Example(string typeName)
    {
        Type myType = FindType(typeName);

        // What goes here to call GenericMethod<T>()?
        GenericMethod<myType>(); // This doesn't work

        // What changes to call StaticMethod<T>()?
        Sample.StaticMethod<myType>(); // This also doesn't work
    }

    public void GenericMethod<T>()
    {
        // ...
    }

    public static void StaticMethod<T>()
    {
        //...
    }
}

Answer 1

This is my 2 cents based on Grax's answer, but with two parameters required for a generic method.

Assume your method is defined as follows in an Helpers class:

public class Helpers
{
    public static U ConvertCsvDataToCollection<U, T>(string csvData)
    where U : ObservableCollection<T>
    {
      //transform code here
    }
}

In my case, U type is always an observable collection storing object of type T.

As I have my types predefined, I first create the "dummy" objects that represent the observable collection (U) and the object stored in it (T) and that will be used below to get their type when calling the Make

object myCollection = Activator.CreateInstance(collectionType);
object myoObject = Activator.CreateInstance(objectType);

Then call the GetMethod to find your Generic function:

MethodInfo method = typeof(Helpers).
GetMethod("ConvertCsvDataToCollection");

So far, the above call is pretty much identical as to what was explained above but with a small difference when you need have to pass multiple parameters to it.

You need to pass an Type[] array to the MakeGenericMethod function that contains the "dummy" objects' types that were create above:

MethodInfo generic = method.MakeGenericMethod(
new Type[] {
   myCollection.GetType(),
   myObject.GetType()
});

Once that's done, you need to call the Invoke method as mentioned above.

generic.Invoke(null, new object[] { csvData });

And you're done. Works a charm!

UPDATE:

As @Bevan highlighted, I do not need to create an array when calling the MakeGenericMethod function as it takes in params and I do not need to create an object in order to get the types as I can just pass the types directly to this function. In my case, since I have the types predefined in another class, I simply changed my code to:

object myCollection = null;

MethodInfo method = typeof(Helpers).
GetMethod("ConvertCsvDataToCollection");

MethodInfo generic = method.MakeGenericMethod(
   myClassInfo.CollectionType,
   myClassInfo.ObjectType
);

myCollection = generic.Invoke(null, new object[] { csvData });

myClassInfo contains 2 properties of type Type which I set at run time based on an enum value passed to the constructor and will provide me with the relevant types which I then use in the MakeGenericMethod.

Thanks again for highlighting this @Bevan.

Answer 2

With C# 4.0, reflection isn't necessary as the DLR can call it using runtime types. Since using the DLR library is kind of a pain dynamically (instead of the C# compiler generating code for you), the open source framework Dynamitey (.net standard 1.5) gives you easy cached run-time access to the same calls the compiler would generate for you.

var name = InvokeMemberName.Create;
Dynamic.InvokeMemberAction(this, name("GenericMethod", new[]{myType}));


var staticContext = InvokeContext.CreateStatic;
Dynamic.InvokeMemberAction(staticContext(typeof(Sample)), name("StaticMethod", new[]{myType}));

Answer 3

Calling a generic method with a type parameter known only at runtime can be greatly simplified by using a dynamic type instead of the reflection API.

To use this technique the type must be known from the actual object (not just an instance of the Type class). Otherwise, you have to create an object of that type or use the standard reflection API solution. You can create an object by using the Activator.CreateInstance method.

If you want to call a generic method, that in "normal" usage would have had its type inferred, then it simply comes to casting the object of unknown type to dynamic. Here's an example:

class Alpha { }
class Beta { }
class Service
{
    public void Process<T>(T item)
    {
        Console.WriteLine("item.GetType(): " + item.GetType()
                          + "\ttypeof(T): " + typeof(T));
    }
}

class Program
{
    static void Main(string[] args)
    {
        var a = new Alpha();
        var b = new Beta();

        var service = new Service();
        service.Process(a); // Same as "service.Process<Alpha>(a)"
        service.Process(b); // Same as "service.Process<Beta>(b)"

        var objects = new object[] { a, b };
        foreach (var o in objects)
        {
            service.Process(o); // Same as "service.Process<object>(o)"
        }
        foreach (var o in objects)
        {
            dynamic dynObj = o;
            service.Process(dynObj); // Or write "service.Process((dynamic)o)"
        }
    }
}

And here's the output of this program:

item.GetType(): Alpha    typeof(T): Alpha
item.GetType(): Beta     typeof(T): Beta
item.GetType(): Alpha    typeof(T): System.Object
item.GetType(): Beta     typeof(T): System.Object
item.GetType(): Alpha    typeof(T): Alpha
item.GetType(): Beta     typeof(T): Beta

Process is a generic instance method that writes the real type of the passed argument (by using the GetType() method) and the type of the generic parameter (by using typeof operator).

By casting the object argument to dynamic type we deferred providing the type parameter until runtime. When the Process method is called with the dynamic argument then the compiler doesn't care about the type of this argument. The compiler generates code that at runtime checks the real types of passed arguments (by using reflection) and choose the best method to call. Here there is only this one generic method, so it's invoked with a proper type parameter.

In this example, the output is the same as if you wrote:

foreach (var o in objects)
{
    MethodInfo method = typeof(Service).GetMethod("Process");
    MethodInfo generic = method.MakeGenericMethod(o.GetType());
    generic.Invoke(service, new object[] { o });
}

The version with a dynamic type is definitely shorter and easier to write. You also shouldn't worry about performance of calling this function multiple times. The next call with arguments of the same type should be faster thanks to the caching mechanism in DLR. Of course, you can write code that cache invoked delegates, but by using the dynamic type you get this behaviour for free.

If the generic method you want to call don't have an argument of a parametrized type (so its type parameter can't be inferred) then you can wrap the invocation of the generic method in a helper method like in the following example:

class Program
{
    static void Main(string[] args)
    {
        object obj = new Alpha();

        Helper((dynamic)obj);
    }

    public static void Helper<T>(T obj)
    {
        GenericMethod<T>();
    }

    public static void GenericMethod<T>()
    {
        Console.WriteLine("GenericMethod<" + typeof(T) + ">");
    }
}

Increased type safety

What is really great about using dynamic object as a replacement for using reflection API is that you only lose compile time checking of this particular type that you don't know until runtime. Other arguments and the name of the method are staticly analysed by the compiler as usual. If you remove or add more arguments, change their types or rename method name then you'll get a compile-time error. This won't happen if you provide the method name as a string in Type.GetMethod and arguments as the objects array in MethodInfo.Invoke.

Below is a simple example that illustrates how some errors can be caught at compile time (commented code) and other at runtime. It also shows how the DLR tries to resolve which method to call.

interface IItem { }
class FooItem : IItem { }
class BarItem : IItem { }
class Alpha { }

class Program
{
    static void Main(string[] args)
    {
        var objects = new object[] { new FooItem(), new BarItem(), new Alpha() };
        for (int i = 0; i < objects.Length; i++)
        {
            ProcessItem((dynamic)objects[i], "test" + i, i);

            //ProcesItm((dynamic)objects[i], "test" + i, i);
            //compiler error: The name 'ProcesItm' does not
            //exist in the current context

            //ProcessItem((dynamic)objects[i], "test" + i);
            //error: No overload for method 'ProcessItem' takes 2 arguments
        }
    }

    static string ProcessItem<T>(T item, string text, int number)
        where T : IItem
    {
        Console.WriteLine("Generic ProcessItem<{0}>, text {1}, number:{2}",
                          typeof(T), text, number);
        return "OK";
    }
    static void ProcessItem(BarItem item, string text, int number)
    {
        Console.WriteLine("ProcessItem with Bar, " + text + ", " + number);
    }
}

Here we again execute some method by casting the argument to the dynamic type. Only verification of first argument's type is postponed to runtime. You will get a compiler error if the name of the method you're calling doesn't exist or if other arguments are invalid (wrong number of arguments or wrong types).

When you pass the dynamic argument to a method then this call is lately bound. Method overload resolution happens at runtime and tries to choose the best overload. So if you invoke the ProcessItem method with an object of BarItem type then you'll actually call the non-generic method, because it is a better match for this type. However, you'll get a runtime error when you pass an argument of the Alpha type because there's no method that can handle this object (a generic method has the constraint where T : IItem and Alpha class doesn't implement this interface). But that's the whole point. The compiler doesn't have information that this call is valid. You as a programmer know this, and you should make sure that this code runs without errors.

Return type gotcha

When you're calling a non-void method with a parameter of dynamic type, its return type will probably be dynamic too. So if you'd change previous example to this code:

var result = ProcessItem((dynamic)testObjects[i], "test" + i, i);

then the type of the result object would be dynamic. This is because the compiler don't always know which method will be called. If you know the return type of the function call then you should implicitly convert it to the required type so the rest of the code is statically typed:

string result = ProcessItem((dynamic)testObjects[i], "test" + i, i);

You'll get a runtime error if the type doesn't match.

Actually, if you try to get the result value in the previous example then you'll get a runtime error in the second loop iteration. This is because you tried to save the return value of a void function.

Answer 4

Nobody provided the "classic Reflection" solution, so here is a complete code example:

using System;
using System.Collections;
using System.Collections.Generic;

namespace DictionaryRuntime
{
    public class DynamicDictionaryFactory
    {
        /// <summary>
        /// Factory to create dynamically a generic Dictionary.
        /// </summary>
        public IDictionary CreateDynamicGenericInstance(Type keyType, Type valueType)
        {
            //Creating the Dictionary.
            Type typeDict = typeof(Dictionary<,>);

            //Creating KeyValue Type for Dictionary.
            Type[] typeArgs = { keyType, valueType };

            //Passing the Type and create Dictionary Type.
            Type genericType = typeDict.MakeGenericType(typeArgs);

            //Creating Instance for Dictionary<K,T>.
            IDictionary d = Activator.CreateInstance(genericType) as IDictionary;

            return d;

        }
    }
}

The above DynamicDictionaryFactory class has a method

CreateDynamicGenericInstance(Type keyType, Type valueType)

and it creates and returns an IDictionary instance, the types of whose keys and values are exactly the specified on the call keyType and valueType.

Here is a complete example how to call this method to instantiate and use a Dictionary<String, int> :

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;

namespace DynamicDictionary
{
    class Test
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            var factory = new DictionaryRuntime.DynamicDictionaryFactory();
            var dict = factory.CreateDynamicGenericInstance(typeof(String), typeof(int));

            var typedDict = dict as Dictionary<String, int>;

            if (typedDict != null)
            {
                Console.WriteLine("Dictionary<String, int>");

                typedDict.Add("One", 1);
                typedDict.Add("Two", 2);
                typedDict.Add("Three", 3);

                foreach(var kvp in typedDict)
                {
                    Console.WriteLine("\"" + kvp.Key + "\": " + kvp.Value);
                }
            }
            else
                Console.WriteLine("null");
        }
    }
}

When the above console application is executed, we get the correct, expected result:

Dictionary<String, int>
"One": 1
"Two": 2
"Three": 3

Answer 5

You need to use reflection to get the method to start with, then "construct" it by supplying type arguments with MakeGenericMethod:

MethodInfo method = typeof(Sample).GetMethod("GenericMethod");
MethodInfo generic = method.MakeGenericMethod(myType);
generic.Invoke(this, null);

For a static method, pass null as the first argument to Invoke. That's nothing to do with generic methods - it's just normal reflection.

As noted, a lot of this is simpler as of C# 4 using dynamic - if you can use type inference, of course. It doesn't help in cases where type inference isn't available, such as the exact example in the question.

Answer 6

Just an addition to the original answer. While this will work:

MethodInfo method = typeof(Sample).GetMethod("GenericMethod");
MethodInfo generic = method.MakeGenericMethod(myType);
generic.Invoke(this, null);

It is also a little dangerous in that you lose compile-time check for GenericMethod. If you later do a refactoring and rename GenericMethod, this code won't notice and will fail at run time. Also, if there is any post-processing of the assembly (for example obfuscating or removing unused methods/classes) this code might break too.

So, if you know the method you are linking to at compile time, and this isn't called millions of times so overhead doesn't matter, I would change this code to be:

Action<> GenMethod = GenericMethod<int>;  //change int by any base type 
                                          //accepted by GenericMethod
MethodInfo method = this.GetType().GetMethod(GenMethod.Method.Name);
MethodInfo generic = method.MakeGenericMethod(myType);
generic.Invoke(this, null);

While not very pretty, you have a compile time reference to GenericMethod here, and if you refactor, delete or do anything with GenericMethod, this code will keep working, or at least break at compile time (if for example you remove GenericMethod).

Other way to do the same would be to create a new wrapper class, and create it through Activator. I don't know if there is a better way.