C# char Examples

Use the char type. Chars are values, similar to ushort, that represent characters.

Char. The char type represents a single character. It is a value type. Char is similar to an integer or ushort. It is 2 bytes in width.char.IsDigit char.IsLower char.ToLower

Casting, strings. A char must be cast when converting to an integer. With an indexer, we access chars in strings. Chars can be incremented in a loop.Strings

Get char. We access a char from "cat." The char at index 0 is the lowercase letter "c." Strings are indexed starting at zero—this is important. We store the char in a local variable.

Also: We test the value of the char variable in an if-statement. Please notice how a char uses single-quotes around it.

Character Literal

C# program that uses char literal using System; class Program { static void Main() { // Get char at first index. char value = "cat"[0]; // If it equals "c" then print something. if (value == 'c') { Console.WriteLine(value + "#"); } } } Output c#

Memory usage. This program performs some operations on a char variable after initializing it to the lowercase letter "a". The lowercase "a" is equal to the integer value 97 in ASCII.

Cast: The program casts the char value to an int value and displays it. This is useful for indexing arrays with characters.

Type: We compare the char to another variable. We then obtain its managed Type pointer.

Typeof, nameof GetType

Memory: We prove that when allocated on the managed heap, a char will occupy 2 bytes of storage, equivalent to a ushort integer.

Struct: Char is a struct in the base class library that is aliased to the char keyword. The "char" keyword aliases the "System.Char" type.

Struct

C# program that demonstrates char type using System; class Program { static void Main() { // // Declare a character and test in certain ways. // char value = 'a'; Console.WriteLine(value); Console.WriteLine((int)value); Console.WriteLine(value == 'y'); Console.WriteLine(value.GetType()); Console.WriteLine(typeof(char)); Console.WriteLine((int)char.MinValue); Console.WriteLine((int)char.MaxValue); // // Determine the memory usage for a single char. // long bytes1 = GC.GetTotalMemory(false); char[] array = new char[1000 * 1000]; array[0] = 'a'; long bytes2 = GC.GetTotalMemory(false); Console.WriteLine(bytes1); Console.WriteLine(bytes2); Console.WriteLine(((bytes2 - bytes1) / (1000 * 1000)).ToString() + " bytes per char"); } } Output a 97 (Integer value of char) False System.Char System.Char 0 (MinValue as an integer) 65535 (MaxValue as an integer) 29252 (Memory measurement 1) 2029284 (Memory measurement 2) 2 bytes per char

Loop, char range. Look at this program. It is pretty exciting. It loops over the lowercase ASCII range from "a" to "z." These chars have integer forms, so can be incremented.

C# program that loops over character rage using System; class Program { static void Main() { // Loop over all lowercase letters. for (char c = 'a'; c <= 'z'; c++) { Console.Write(c); Console.Write(' '); } } } Output a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z

Convert int to char. Sometimes we have an int and wish to convert it into its equivalent char. We can place the char in a char array, which can be turned into a string.Convert

Part 1: We loop over the numbers 97 through 99. We cast from an int to a char—this is required, as an int is larger than a char.

Int, uint

Part 2: We convert the array to a string with the string constructor. So we turned 3 ints into a string.

String Constructor

C# program that converts ints to chars using System; class Program { static void Main() { char[] array = new char[100]; int write = 0; // Part 1: convert 3 ints to chars, and place them into the array. for (int i = 97; i < 100; i++) { array[write++] = (char)i; } // Part 2: convert array to string, and print it. Console.WriteLine("RESULT: {0}", new string(array, 0, write)); } } Output RESULT: abc

Char.IsControl. Certain characters do not represent a letter. Instead a char can represent a vertical space or even a beep. IsControl detects these chars.

Note: The char.IsControl method returns true or false depending on if the character is a non-printing character.

Bool

Info: The program uses the char.IsControl method. Characters are tested to see if they are control characters with IsControl.

For

Results: We see the control characters in the character set in the char type are equal to the decimal representations of 0-31, and 127-159.

Newlines: The characters \r and \n are equal to 13 and 10, and these are shown to be control characters.

C# program that tests IsControl method using System; class Program { static void Main() { // Loop through all possible char values and test for control. for (int i = 0; i < char.MaxValue; i++) { char c = (char)i; if (char.IsControl(c)) { Console.WriteLine("Is control: {0}", i); } } // See if carriage return is a control character. Console.WriteLine("Is control: {0}", char.IsControl("\r\n", 0)); } } Output Is control: 0 Is control: 1 Is control: 2 Is control: 3 Is control: 4 Is control: 5 Is control: 6 Is control: 7 Is control: 8 Is control: 9 Is control: 10 Is control: 11 Is control: 12 Is control: 13 Is control: 14 Is control: 15 Is control: 16 Is control: 17 Is control: 18 Is control: 19 Is control: 20 Is control: 21 Is control: 22 Is control: 23 Is control: 24 Is control: 25 Is control: 26 Is control: 27 Is control: 28 Is control: 29 Is control: 30 Is control: 31 Is control: 127 Is control: 128 Is control: 129 Is control: 130 Is control: 131 Is control: 132 Is control: 133 Is control: 134 Is control: 135 Is control: 136 Is control: 137 Is control: 138 Is control: 139 Is control: 140 Is control: 141 Is control: 142 Is control: 143 Is control: 144 Is control: 145 Is control: 146 Is control: 147 Is control: 148 Is control: 149 Is control: 150 Is control: 151 Is control: 152 Is control: 153 Is control: 154 Is control: 155 Is control: 156 Is control: 157 Is control: 158 Is control: 159 Is control: True

Char.IsLetterOrDigit. This method tests a char. It determines if the char is a letter or digit. We loop over the characters in an example string to learn about its results.

Here: The letters and digits, but not the spaces, hyphen and other punctuation received a true value from IsLetterOrDigit.

True, False

Note: The method's output is equivalent to the expression (char.IsLetter(letter) || char.IsDigit(letter)).

C# program that uses char.IsLetterOrDigit using System; class Program { static void Main() { string input = "dot net Codex 867-5309?!"; Console.WriteLine(input); foreach (char letter in input) { bool isLetterOrDigit = char.IsLetterOrDigit(letter); if (isLetterOrDigit) { Console.Write('^'); } else { Console.Write(' '); } } Console.WriteLine(); } } Output dot net Codex 867-5309?! ^^^ ^^^ ^^^^^ ^^^ ^^^^

Char.IsPunctuation. The char.IsPunctuation method matches periods, commas and other similar characters. It matches punctuation characters that are found in Unicode.

Here: We loop over an example string, and call IsPunctuation on each character. The commas, and question marks, are considered punctuation.

C# program that uses IsPunctuation using System; class Program { static void Main() { string test = "Hello, friend, how are you?"; // Loop over the chars, and display each punctuation character. foreach (char value in test) { if (char.IsPunctuation(value)) { Console.WriteLine("ISPUNCTUATION: {0}", value); } } } } Output ISPUNCTUATION: , ISPUNCTUATION: , ISPUNCTUATION: ?

Char.IsSeparator. What does the char.IsSeparator method do? IsSeparator refers to the Unicode concept of separator characters, which separate words.

Return: IsSeparator returns whether or not the char is a separator. A space is a separator, but a period is not considered one.

Here: The program outputs all the possible separator chars. Most of them cannot be displayed in the console.

Paths: File paths also have a concept of separators. These are not the same kind of separators as are described in Unicode.

Path

C# program that uses char.IsSeparator using System; class Program { static void Main() { Console.WriteLine(char.IsSeparator(' ')); Console.WriteLine(char.IsSeparator('.')); for (char c = char.MinValue; c < char.MaxValue; c++) { if (char.IsSeparator(c)) { Console.WriteLine("{0} {1}", c, (int)c); } } } } Output True False 32 160 ? 5760 ? 6158 8192 8193 8194 8195 8196 8197 8198 ? 8199 ? 8200 ? 8201 ? 8202 ? 8232 ? 8233 ? 8239 ? 8287 12288

Char.IsWhiteSpace. The char.IsWhiteSpace method tests for spaces and newlines. In this example, we see how the char.IsWhiteSpace method is called.

Static: Because it is a static method, you must specify the type in the composite name, not a variable. We use it 3 times.

Static

Return: IsWhiteSpace returns a boolean value, which means it can be used in the context of an if-expression.

Note: The lowercase letter "a" is not a whitespace char. The space and the \n are whitespace chars.

C# program that uses char.IsWhiteSpace method using System; class Program { static void Main() { // Tests the char.IsWhiteSpace method three times. char value = 'a'; if (char.IsWhiteSpace(value)) { Console.WriteLine(1); } value = ' '; if (char.IsWhiteSpace(value)) { Console.WriteLine(2); } value = '\n'; if (char.IsWhiteSpace(value)) { Console.WriteLine(3); } } } Output 2 3

Char testing, performance. The performance of character-testing methods is often improved with a lookup table. This reduces the cost of the method to a single array access.

And: If most of your characters are digits, testing first to see if the character is a digit would be fastest.

Arrays. The char data type is used as part of an array or string. You can easily convert character arrays to strings, and strings to char[] arrays.

Tip: You will often use character arrays in C# programs. These can be useful for optimizations, or for creating buffers.

Char Array ToCharArray Convert Char Array, String

Research. Char is a special type. I researched it in the C# specification. I found a char is similar to a ushort but with restrictions.

Usage: At a high level, the types are used differently. This is enforced by the compiler.

Quote: Although char has the same representation as ushort, not all operations permitted on one are permitted on the other (The C# Programming Language).

A summary. For compatibility, a char in the C# language is 2 bytes. This makes it less efficient. But speed is less important than a program that works.

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C# char Examples

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