December 2018 Archives

Practical Design Patterns in C# – Prototype

December 29, 2018January 5, 2023 Pranav Negandhi

Intent

The prototype pattern simplifies creating instances of a class by copying the contents of an existing instance to create a new one. This alleviates the cost of any expensive computation or I/O being performed in the constructor, or simply copies over the state of an existing object to the new instance for further modification.

The source code for this design pattern, and all the others, can be viewed in the Practical Design Patterns repository.

Problem

This article demonstrates a document editor that has the ability to make and display multiple concurrent snap shots of a document. Each can be reviewed and edited individually and compared with each other. The process begins with a single document in memory, which the user can edit before cloning. When a draft is ready, the user duplicates the object by invoking a command from the UI. This copies the contents of the document over into a new instance. The document also contains a date and time field which is modified to match the time when the duplicate is created.

PlantUML Syntax: 
!theme vibrant
interface ICloneable<T> { 
+ Clone() 
}
class Document { 
-version 
+CreatedOn 
+Text 
+Clone() 
}
class Client #palegreen
Document .up.|> ICloneable
Document -down-> Document : clones
Client -right-> Document

Both versions now exist in memory simultaneously and the user can cycle between them as needed.

Solution

For this, there must be a way for the document class to be duplicated. The .NET framework already defines an interface called System.ICloneable with a method called Clone() for just this purpose. The caveat of this technique is that the return type of the Clone() method is an object, thus requiring type-casting of the object instance which is returned. It is quite easy to declare a generic version of the ICloneable interface to avoid this problem.

public interface ICloneable<T>
{
    T Clone();
}

The Document class implements this interface as shown below. This snippet also shows the CreatedOn and Text properties that the Document class exposes.

[Serializable]
public class Document : ICloneable<Document>
{
    private int _version = 0;

    public Document()
    {
        CreatedOn = DateTime.UtcNow;
        Text = string.Empty;
        _version = 1;
    }

    public DateTime CreatedOn
    {
        get;
        private set;
    }

    public string Text
    {
        get;
        set;
    }

    public Document Clone()
    {
        Document clone;

        using (var stream = new MemoryStream())
        {
            var formatter = new BinaryFormatter();
            formatter.Serialize(stream, this);
            var self = stream.ToArray();

            stream.Seek(0, SeekOrigin.Begin);
            clone = (Document)formatter.Deserialize(stream);
            clone.CreatedOn = DateTime.UtcNow;
            clone._version++;
        }

        return clone;
    }
}

When the document instance has to be duplicated, the client calls the Clone method to create a whole new instance of the object based on the contents of the original.

The implementation of the Clone method itself is highly specific to the language and platform in use. The example above demonstrates a straightforward binary copy by serializing the class into a byte array, then immediately serializing it back into a new object instance. This mandates that the Document class be decorated with the Serializable attribute.

This technique works in C# and other .NET languages which implement the BinaryFormatter and MemoryStream APIs.

Another technique to create a duplicate is calling the constructor and setting each property and field individually. Since the Clone method is a part of the same class, it has access to the private members of the new instance as well.

private Document Clone()
{
    var clone = new Document();
    clone.CreatedOn = DateTime.UtcNow;
    clone.Text = Text;
    clone._version++;

    return clone;
}

Finally, the .NET Framework provides a built-in method called MemberwiseClone, which creates a shallow object copy.

private Document Clone()
{
    var clone = (Document)base.MemberwiseClone();
    clone.CreatedOn = DateTime.UtcNow;
    clone._version++;

    return clone;
}

All methods shown above create a shallow copy of the object. In order to create a deep copy, each reference type that the Document class uses must implement a similar Clone method which is invoked when the instance has to be cloned. This can quickly escalate out of hand if these classes further reference other types. For this reason, this pattern is best applied to classes that use value types only.

Practical Design Patterns in C# – Builder

December 22, 2018January 5, 2023 Pranav Negandhi

Intent

The builder pattern abstracts multiple steps required to create a complex object into a coherent interface. Objects that need several input parameters are prime candidates for refactoring behind a builder object.

The source code for this design pattern, and all the others, can be viewed in the Practical Design Patterns repository.

Problem

To understand the benefits of this pattern, we must first analyse some code that does not utilise it.

var message = new MailMessage("john@example.com",
                "jane@example.com",
                "101 Ways to Refactor",
                "Lorem ipsu…");

Quick, can you identify what is each parameter in this statement? Is John the sender or recipient? How do you add more than one recipient? How does one create HTML-formatted email? These questions are not immediately obvious. And adding more configurability into the MailMessage class would make for ever longer constructor calls.

A more readable alternative is clearly required, at least to retain the maintenance programmer’s sanity for the future. And there’s our hook for the builder pattern.

Solution

The fundamental type in this example is the builder itself, EmailBuilder in this case. This class separates the components of the message into discrete methods.

public class EmailBuilder
{
    private MailMessage _message;

    public EmailBuilder()
    {
        _message = new MailMessage();
    }

    public EmailBuilder AddressedTo(string recipient)
    {
        …
    }

    public EmailBuilder From(string sender)
    {
        …
    }

    public EmailBuilder WithBody(string body)
    {
        …
    }

    public EmailBuilder WithSubject(string subject)
    {
        …
    }

    public MailMessage GetResults()
    {
        return _message;
    }
}

The client code consumes this interface by invoking each method one after the other. All methods in the builder class return the instance itself (i.e. this) so that multiple methods can be chained together into a single, fluid statement.

var builder = new EmailBuilder();
var message = builder.From("john@example.com")
    .AddressedTo("jane@example.com")
    .AddressedTo("jim@example.com")
    .WithSubject("101 Ways to Refactor")
    .WithBody("Lorem ipsu…")
    .GetResults();

This simple class already makes the code exponentially readable and maintainable. But there’s more!

What if the program has to create multiple types of messages, such as an email plus a browser notification encoded into a JSON object? The API from the EmailBuilder can be easily extracted into an IMessageBuilder interface, then applied to different types of builders.

public interface IMessageBuilder<T>
{
    IMessageBuilder WithSubject(string subject);

    IMessageBuilder<T> WithBody(string body);

    IMessageBuilder<T> From(string sender);

    IMessageBuilder<T> AddressedTo(string recipient);

    T GetResults();
 }

This is a generic interface as the return type of each builder differs, depending on the type of message it creates. As a result, the EmailBuilder class definition and method signatures change as shown below. Any code that consumes this class is not affected.

public class EmailBuilder : IMessageBuilder<MailMessage>
{
    private MailMessage _message;

    public EmailBuilder()
    {
        _message = new MailMessage();
    }

    public IMessageBuilder<MailMessage> AddressedTo(string recipient)
    {
        …
    }

    public IMessageBuilder<MailMessage> From(string sender)
    {
        …
    }

    public IMessageBuilder<MailMessage> WithBody(string body)
    {
        …
    }

    public IMessageBuilder<MailMessage> WithSubject(string subject)
    {
        …
    }

    public MailMessage GetResults()
    {
        return _message;
    }
}

This done, we can move on to the JSON builder. For this example, we use types defined in the wildly popular Json.NET library from Newtonsoft.

public class JsonBuilder : IMessageBuilder<string>
{
    private StringBuilder _builder;

    private JsonTextWriter _writer;

    public JsonBuilder()
    {
        _builder = new StringBuilder();
        var sw = new StringWriter(_builder);
        _writer = new JsonTextWriter(sw);
        _writer.WriteStartObject();
    }

    public IMessageBuilder<string> AddressedTo(string recipient)
    {
        _writer.WritePropertyName("AddressedTo");
        _writer.WriteValue(recipient);
        return this;
    }

    public IMessageBuilder<string> From(string sender)
    {
        _writer.WritePropertyName("From");
        _writer.WriteValue(sender);
        return this;
    }

    public IMessageBuilder<string> WithBody(string body)
    {
        _writer.WritePropertyName("Body");
        _writer.WriteValue(body);
        return this;
    }

    public IMessageBuilder<string> WithSubject(string subject)
    {
        _writer.WritePropertyName("Subject");
        _writer.WriteValue(subject);
        return this;
    }

    public string Build()
    {
        _writer.WriteEndObject();
        return _builder.ToString();
    }
}

The client code must instantiate the JsonBuilder and invoke the same methods on it as it does on any other builder. Each builder can have its own customisations, such as only storing a single recipient’s name in the JSON object, which gets overwritten by any subsequent call to AddressedTo().

var builder = new JsonBuilder();
var message = builder.From("john@example.com")
    .AddressedTo("jane@example.com")
    .AddressedTo("jim@example.com")
    .WithSubject("101 Ways to Refactor")
    .WithBody("Lorem ipsu…")
    .GetResults();

Practical Design Patterns in C# – Abstract Factory

December 15, 2018January 5, 2023 Pranav Negandhi

Intent

The abstract factory design pattern provides an interface to create instances of related objects without directly specifying their concrete classes. This pattern is a superset of the factory method design pattern, as it separates the creation of an object from consumption, while adding the necessary checks to ensure that only related types of objects can be instantiated at a given time.

Problem

In this example, we look at an application that offers options to connect to SQL Server or MySQL database engines to store its data. A rudimentary way of implementing this functionality is to pepper the code with if-else statements throughout the application, which is impractical, brittle and error prone – all traits to avoid in good code.

The source code for this design pattern, and all the others, can be viewed in the Practical Design Patterns repository.

A database operation requires types to make a connection to the database, a command to contain the query and a type to hold a query parameter. All three have to belong to the same family in order to operate correctly. Swapping any type of them for a type from another family is not allowed. E.g. a MySQL connection instance will not be able to operate with a SQL Server command instance. Therefore, if a program has to offer the ability to work with various types of database engines, it has to guarantee that only compatible types are instantiated at a given time.

Solution

This pattern consists of at least 2 types – one to define the factory interface, and a concrete factory class that implements this interface. More families of related objects are added to the application by implementing more factories.

The core API is provided by the IDbFactory interface.

public interface IDbFactory
{
    IDbConnection CreateDbConnection();

    IDbCommand CreateDbCommand();

    IDbDataParameter CreateDbDataParameter();
}

IDbFactory defines methods for the database factory. IDbConnection, IDbCommand and IDbDataParameter are interfaces provided by the framework in the System.Data namespace. All major third-party database vendors provide bindings for their engines which are compatible with these interfaces.

SQL Server Factory

When the application has to operate against SQL Server, it instantiates the SqlFactory class, which implements the IDbFactory interface, and returns the SQL Server-specific concrete types for IDbConnection, IDbCommand and IDbDataParameter.

public class SqlFactory : IDbFactory
{
    public IDbConnection CreateDbConnection()
    {
        return new System.Data.SqlClient.SqlConnection();
    }

    public IDbCommand CreateDbCommand()
    {
        return new System.Data.SqlClient.SqlDbCommand();
    }

    public IDbDataParameter CreateDbDataParmeter()
    {
        return new System.Data.SqlClient.SqlParameter();
    }
}

MySQL Factory

The MySqlFactory class operates in the same way and returns objects from the MySql.Data.MySqlClient namespace.

public class MySqlFactory : IDbFactory
{
    public IDbConnection CreateDbConnection()
    {
        return new MySql.Data.MySqlClient.MySqlConnection();
    }

    public IDbCommand CreateDbCommand()
    {
        return new MySql.Data.MySqlClient.MySqlCommand();
    }

    public IDbDataParameter CreateDbDataParameter()
    {
        return new MySql.Data.MySqlClient.MySqlParameter();
    }
}

Usage

When the application is launched, it determines the database engine it has to operate against (through UI or configuration or some other means), and then instantiates the appropriate IDbFactory implementation. All objects required to operate on the database are subsequently instantiated from this IDbFactory instance.

public class Program
{
    public static void Main(string[] args)
    {
        IDbFactory factory;

        if ("sql" == args[1])
        {
            factory = new SqlFactory();
        }
        else
        {
            factory = new MySqlFactory();
        }

        using (var connection = factory.CreateDbConnection())
        {
            connection.Open();
            var command = factory.CreateDbCommand();
            command.Connection = connection;
            command.CommandText = "SELECT * FROM [Users] WHERE [UserId] = ?";
            var param = factory.CreateDbDataParameter();
            param.DbType = DbType.Int32;
            param.Value = 42;
            command.Parameters.Add(param);

            command.ExecuteReader();
        }
    }
}

Practical Design Patterns in C# – Factory Method

December 8, 2018January 5, 2023 Pranav Negandhi

Intent

The factory method is exactly what is says on the label – a method that produces object instances on demand. Ergo, a factory method. The intent of this pattern is to implement a method (in class or instance scope) that separates the creation of object instances from the consumption. It is often used to lazily instantiate objects during dependency injection. The factory method is the foundation to the abstract factory.

Problem

In this example, we look at an application that has to write data to one of two different file formats. The format is selected at runtime through some kind of user input. The application should be able to select the appropriate file encoder, and request it to serialize the data.

Solution

Separate file writer classes are required for each format, but both must share a common interface. The correct class is instantiated, and its Write method is invoked to perform the save operation.

The source code for this design pattern, and all the others, can be viewed in the Practical Design Patterns repository.

All writer classes are required to implement the IFileWriter interface.

public interface IFileWriter
{
    void Write(byte[] data, string filename);
}

This interface is implemented by each writer class. The example below shows the JpegWriter and PngWriter classes.

public class JpegWriter : IFileWriter
{
    void Write(byte[] data, string filename) { … }
}

public class PngWriter : IFileWriter
{
    void Write(byte[] data, string filename) { … }
}

Then a factory interface is declared, and a factory class created for each file type.

public interface IFileWriterFactory
{
    public IFileWriter Create();
}

public class JpegWriterFactory : IFileWriterFactory
{
    public Create()
    {
        return new JpegWriter();
    }
}

public class PngWriterFactory : IFileWriterFactory
{
    public Create()
    {
        return new PngWriter();
    }
}

Usage

The application determines the file type that is required, then invokes the Create method on the appropriate writer factory, which in turn returns a concrete implementation of the IFileWriter class.

The application then invokes the Write method on the writer instance, which handles format-specific details such as endianness, file headers, encoding and more.

static class Program
{
    private static _jpegWriterFactory = new JpegWriterFactory();

    private static _pngWriterFactory = new PngWriterFactory();

    static void Main()
    {
        // Image created and serialized into byte[]
        …

        IFileWriter writer;
        if ("jpg" == args[1])
        {
            writer = _jpegWriterFactory.Create();
        }
        else
        {
            writer = _pngWriterFactory.Create();
        }

        writer.Write(data, "lena");
    }
}

Month: December 2018

Practical Design Patterns in C# – Prototype

Intent

Problem

Solution

Practical Design Patterns in C# – Builder

Intent

Problem

Solution

Practical Design Patterns in C# – Abstract Factory

Intent

Problem

Solution

SQL Server Factory

MySQL Factory

Usage

Practical Design Patterns in C# – Factory Method

Intent

Problem

Solution

Usage

Favourites

Entity Framework Basics

Code First

Creational Design Patterns

Structural Design Patterns