Accessing a property of derived class from the base class in C#

Question

In C#, what is the best way to access a property of the derived class when the generic list contains just the base class.

public class ClassA : BaseClass
{
   public object PropertyA { get; set; }
}

public class ClassB: BaseClass
{
    public object PropertyB { get; set; }
}

public class BaseClass
{
}

public void Main
{
    List<BaseClass> MyList = new List<BaseClass>();
    ClassA a = new ClassA();
    ClassB b = new ClassB();

    MyList.Add(a);
    MyList.Add(b);

    for(int i = 0; i < MyList.Count; i++)
    {
        //I would like to access PropertyA abd PropertyB from the derived classes        
    }
}

Answer 1

Certainly you can downcast, like so:

for (int i = 0; i < MyList.Count; i++)
{
    if (MyList[i] is ClassA)
    {
        var a = ((ClassA)MyList[i]).PropertyA;
        // do stuff with a
    }

    if (MyList[i] is ClassB)
    {
        var b = ((ClassB)MyList[i]).PropertyB;
        // do stuff with b
    }
}

... However, you should take another look at what you're trying to accomplish. If you have common code that needs to get to properties of ClassA and ClassB, then you may be better off wrapping access to those properties up into a shared, virtual property or method in the ancestor class.

Something like:

public class BaseClass
{
    public virtual void DoStuff() { }
}

public class ClassA : BaseClass
{
    public object PropertyA { get; set; }

    public override void DoStuff() 
    {
        // do stuff with PropertyA 
    }
}

public class ClassB : BaseClass
{
    public object PropertyB { get; set; }

    public override void DoStuff() 
    {
        // do stuff with PropertyB
    }
}

Answer 2

Further to TimJ's answer, you can write one extension method that will work for all types:

public static IEnumerable<T> OfType<T>(this IEnumerable list)
{
    foreach (var obj in list)
    {
        if (obj is T)
            yield return (T)obj;
    }
}

Or if you have Linq, that function is in the namespace System.Linq.