Read-Only List in C#

Question

I have some class with List-property:

class Foo {   private List<int> myList; } 

I want provide access to this field only for read.

I.e. I want property with access to Enumerable, Count, etc. and without access to Clear, Add, Remove, etc. How I can do it?

Answer 1

You can expose a List<T> as a ReadOnlyCollection<T> by using the AsReadOnly() method

C# 6.0 and later (using Expression Bodied Properties)

class Foo {     private List<int> myList;    public ReadOnlyCollection<int> ReadOnlyList => myList.AsReadOnly();  } 

C# 5.0 and earlier

class Foo {    private List<int> myList;    public ReadOnlyCollection<int> ReadOnlyList {      get {          return myList.AsReadOnly();      }   } }