How to write a getter and setter for a Dictionary?

Question

How do you define a getter and setter for complex data types such as a dictionary?

public Dictionary<string, string> Users {     get     {         return m_Users;     }      set     {         m_Users = value;     } } 

This returns the entire dictionary? Can you write the setter to look and see if a specific key-value pair exists and then if it doesn't, add it. Else update the current key value pair? For the get, can you return a specific key-value pair instead of the whole dictionary?

Answer 1

Use an indexer property (MSDN):

public class YourClass {     private readonly IDictionary<string, string> _yourDictionary = new Dictionary<string, string>();      public string this[string key]     {         // returns value if exists         get { return _yourDictionary[key]; }          // updates if exists, adds if doesn't exist         set { _yourDictionary[key] = value; }     } } 

Then use like:

var test = new YourClass(); test["Item1"] = "Value1";