Expression-bodied Function Members in C# 6.0

Description

This article describes a new feature of C# 6.0 using Visual Studio Ultimate 2015 Preview.

Content

As we all know Microsoft has launched a new version of C# called C# 6.0 with Visual Studio Ultimate 2015 Preview and there is a new feature in C# 6.0 based on "Expression bodies of function members".

Sometimes we create small functions with 1 or 2 lines to do some task or activities like conversion or printing. So in C# 6.0 this feature allows us to optimize that function with a “Lamda Expression” like:

public int  FunctionName() => 0;

We can use methods, properties and other kinds of function members to have bodies that are expressions instead of statement blocks, just like with lambda expressions.

Let's see this feature.

I am using Visual Studio Ultimate 2015 Preview.



Open Visual Studio 2015 and select "File" -> "New" -> "Project" and fill in the project name such as "Console Application1".



After creating the project, I will access some common static methods in "program.cs" without using a class name every time.

Example 1

In this example, I will write a method that will print the string value.

Code

class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {

            PrintString("Welcome To C# Corner");
            Console.ReadKey();

        }
        public static void PrintString(string str)
        {
            Console.WriteLine(str);
        }
    }

It will give the output:



But in C# 6.0 we can optimize this method definition with a "Lamda Expression" in a single line.

class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {

            PrintString("Welcome To C# Corner");
            Console.ReadKey();

        }

        public static void PrintString(string str) => Console.WriteLine(str);

    }

Output




Example 2

In this example, I will write a method that will get 2 integer values and provide the product of them as a result.

Code

class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {

            Console.WriteLine(multiply(2, 3).ToString());
            Console.ReadKey();

        }
        public static int multiply(int var1, int var2)
        {
            return (var1 * var2);
        }
    }

It will give the output:



But in C# 6.0 we can optimize this method definition with a "Lamda Expression" in a single line.

class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {

            Console.WriteLine(multiply(2, 3).ToString());
            Console.ReadKey();

        }
        public static int multiply(int var1, int var2) => (var1 * var2);
    }

Output



Conclusion

Now you have understood the new feature of C# 6.0 that allows the use of "Expression bodies of function members".