Keep in mind that the string class is immutable. It cannot be changed after it is created. That explains why it doesn't have a parameterless constructor, it could never generate a useful string object other than an empty string. That's already available in the C# language, it is "".
Same reasoning applies for a string(String) constructor. There is no point in duplicating a string, the string you'd pass to the constructor is already a perfectly good instance of the string.
So fix your problem by testing for the string case:
var oType = oVal.GetType();
if (oType == typeof(string)) return oVal as string;
else return Activator.CreateInstance(oType, oVal);
You are trying to do this :
var sz = new string();
Try to compile it, you will understand your error.
You may try :
var sz = Activator.CreateInstance(typeof(string), new object[] {"value".ToCharArray()});
But it looks useless, you should directly use value...
It looks like you're trying to call a constructor which just takes a string - and there isn't such a constructor. If you've already got a string, why are you trying to create a new one? (When you didn't provide any further arguments, you were trying to call a parameterless constructor - which again, doesn't exist.)
Note that typeof(string)
is a simpler way to get a reference to the string type.
Could you give us more information about the bigger picture of what you're trying to do?
String actually has no constructor that takes a string as input. There is a constructor that takes a char array so this should work:
var sz = Activator.CreateInstance ("".GetType (), "Test".ToCharArray ());
This is what I use in my projects. As far as needing to create an instantiation of a type of object and not knowing at design time, is rather normal for me. Perhaps you are cycling through object properties and you want to instantiate all of them dynamically. I have many times needed to create then assign values to non instantiated POCO objects... with the below code you can use a string value stored in the DB to instantiate an object as well or instantiate an object stored in a library that is referencing your library - so you can bypass circular reference errors as well... Hope it helps.
using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Globalization;
using System.Reflection;
/// <summary>
/// Instantiates an object. Must pass PropertyType.AssemblyQualifiedName for factory to operate
/// returns instantiated object
/// </summary>
/// <param name="typeName"></param>
/// <returns></returns>
public static object Create(string typeAssemblyQualifiedName)
{
// resolve the type
Type targetType = ResolveType(typeAssemblyQualifiedName);
if (targetType == null)
throw new ArgumentException("Unable to resolve object type: " + typeAssemblyQualifiedName);
return Create(targetType);
}
/// <summary>
/// create by type of T
/// </summary>
/// <typeparam name="T"></typeparam>
/// <returns></returns>
public static T Create<T>()
{
Type targetType = typeof(T);
return (T)Create(targetType);
}
/// <summary>
/// general object creation
/// </summary>
/// <param name="targetType"></param>
/// <returns></returns>
public static object Create(Type targetType)
{
//string test first - it has no parameterless constructor
if (Type.GetTypeCode(targetType) == TypeCode.String)
return string.Empty;
// get the default constructor and instantiate
Type[] types = new Type[0];
ConstructorInfo info = targetType.GetConstructor(types);
object targetObject = null;
if (info == null) //must not have found the constructor
if (targetType.BaseType.UnderlyingSystemType.FullName.Contains("Enum"))
targetObject = Activator.CreateInstance(targetType);
else
throw new ArgumentException("Unable to instantiate type: " + targetType.AssemblyQualifiedName + " - Constructor not found");
else
targetObject = info.Invoke(null);
if (targetObject == null)
throw new ArgumentException("Unable to instantiate type: " + targetType.AssemblyQualifiedName + " - Unknown Error");
return targetObject;
}
/// <summary>
/// Loads the assembly of an object. Must pass PropertyType.AssemblyQualifiedName for factory to operate
/// Returns the object type.
/// </summary>
/// <param name="typeString"></param>
/// <returns></returns>
public static Type ResolveType(string typeAssemblyQualifiedName)
{
int commaIndex = typeAssemblyQualifiedName.IndexOf(",");
string className = typeAssemblyQualifiedName.Substring(0, commaIndex).Trim();
string assemblyName = typeAssemblyQualifiedName.Substring(commaIndex + 1).Trim();
if (className.Contains("[]"))
className.Remove(className.IndexOf("[]"), 2);
// Get the assembly containing the handler
Assembly assembly = null;
try
{
assembly = Assembly.Load(assemblyName);
}
catch
{
try
{
assembly = Assembly.LoadWithPartialName(assemblyName);//yes yes this is obsolete but it is only a backup call
}
catch
{
throw new ArgumentException("Can't load assembly " + assemblyName);
}
}
// Get the handler
return assembly.GetType(className, false, false);
}
If you love us? You can donate to us via Paypal or buy me a coffee so we can maintain and grow! Thank you!
Donate Us With