Require a class to be instanced in C#?

Question

We need to "protect" a class from having static methods for security purposes. We don't want newbie devs following suggestions of coding tools to make a member static as we need to use a constructor with a password to control access to this class.

Is there any way to protect a .NET class in C# to prevent it from have any static members?

Would such a feature, if not available, be worthwhile for a future version of .NET?

Thank you.

Answer 1

we need to use a constructor with a password to control access to this class.

This sounds like a monumentally bad idea, but of course I know nothing about the security problem you're trying to solve. This is the far more interesting question than your question: What is the threat you are attempting to protect against? There is probably a better way to do it.

Is there any way to protect a .NET class in C# to prevent it from have any static members?

Have senior developers review the checkins of junior developers. Which you should be doing anyway, but particularly if the class has some kind of security semantics.

Would such a feature, if not available, be worthwhile for a future version of .NET?

That's unlikely in the extreme.

Thank you.

You're welcome!

Answer 2

The easiest thing to do would be to set-up FxCop on your build server and write a custom FxCop rule to check for static members.

This question has details on how to write a custom FxCop rule.

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Alternatively, as SimpleCoder pointed out, you can use StyleCop to enforce the rule on the source code.

This page describes how to set-up StyleCop with msbuild.