How Can I Cast to Anonymous Types in a WinForms BindingSource?

Casting to Anonymous Types

In the context of WinForm's BindingSource, you may encounter the challenge of retrieving the type and property values of an anonymous type from the BindingSource's Current property. While anonymous types provide a convenient way to define lightweight data structures, working with them can present casting challenges.

To address this issue, you can employ a technique that utilizes compiler inference:

private static void TestMethod(Object x)
{
    // Dummy value to establish the desired type
    var a = new { Id = 0, Name = "" };
    a = Cast(a, x);
    Console.Out.WriteLine(a.Id + ": " + a.Name);
}

private static T Cast<T>(T typeHolder, Object x)
{
    return (T)x;
}

In this code, the Cast function leverages the typeHolder parameter to infer the desired type for x. This trick exploits the fact that anonymous types with identical properties and order map to the same underlying type.

Consider the following usage:

var value = x.CastTo(a);

While this approach allows you to access the properties of the anonymous type, it's generally recommended to employ real types for data structures that will be passed around in your application. Anonymous types are best suited for local, single-method use.

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