Methods: A Deeper Look

Chapter 7 of Visual C# How to Program, 6/e

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7.2 Packaging Code in C#
 So far, we’ve used properties, methods and classes to
package code.
 C# apps are written by combining your properties, methods

and classes with predefined properties, methods and

classes available in the .NET Framework Class Library and
in other class libraries.
 Related classes are often grouped into namespaces and

compiled into class libraries so that they can be reused in

other apps.
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7.2.1 Modularizing Programs
 Methods allow you to modularize an app by separating its
tasks into reusable units.
 Motivations for modularizing an app with methods

 Software reuse—existing methods can be used as building blocks

to create new apps.
 Avoid repeating code.
 Making programs easier to test, debug and maintain
 Dividing an app into meaningful methods makes the app
easier to debug and maintain.
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7.2.2 Calling Methods
 As you know, a method is invoked by a method call, and
when the called method completes its task, it returns
control and possibly a result to its caller.
 An analogy to the method-call-and-return structure is the

hierarchical form of management (Fig. 7.1).

 The boss method does not know how the worker method performs its designated
tasks.
 The worker may also call other worker methods.
 This hiding of implementation details promotes good software
engineering.
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7.3 static Methods, static Variables and Class Math
 A method that applies to the class as a whole is known as a static
method.
 To declare a method as static, place the keyword static before the

return type in the method’s declaration.

 You call any static method by specifying the name of the class in

which the method is declared, followed by the member access (.)

operator and the method name.

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7.3.1 Math Class Methods
 Class Math provides a collection of static methods that enable you to
perform common mathematical calculations.
 You do not need to create a Math object before calling method Sqrt.
 Method arguments may be constants, variables or expressions.

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7.3.1 Math Class Methods
 Figure 7.2 summarizes several Math class methods. In the figure, x and
y are of type double.

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7.3 static Methods, static Variables and Class Math
(Cont.)
 When objects of a class containing static variables are created, all the
objects of that class share one copy of the class’s static variables.
 Together the static variables and instance variables represent the fields

of a class.

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7.3.3 Why Is Main Declared static?
 Main is sometimes called the app’s entry point.
 Declaring Main as static allows the execution

environment to invoke Main without creating an instance of

the class.

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7.3.4 Additional Comments about Main
 You can place a Main method in every class you declare.
 Some programmers take advantage of this to build a small test app into

each class they declare.

 If you declare more than one Main method among the classes of your

project, you’ll need to indicate to the IDE which one you would like to
be the app’s entry point:
 With the project open in Visual Studio, select Project > [ProjectName]
Properties... (where [ProjectName] is the name of your project).
 Select the class containing the Main method that should be the entry point from
the Startup object list box.

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7.4 Methods with Multiple Parameters
 Fig. 7.3 declares method Maximum which determines and returns the
largest of three double values.

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7.4.1 Keyword static
 Method Maximum’s declaration begins with keyword static, which
enables the Main method (another static method) to call Maximum as
shown in line 19 without creating an object of class MaximumFinder
and without qualifying the method name with the class name
MaximumFinder.
 Static methods in the same class can call each other directly.

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7.4.2 Method Maximum
 When a method has more than one parameter, the parameters are
specified as a comma-separated list.
 Each argument must be consistent with the type of the corresponding

parameter.
 When program control returns from a method, that method’s

parameters are no longer accessible in memory.

 Methods can return at most one value.

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7.4 Methods with Multiple Parameters (Cont.)
 When to Declare Variables as Fields of a Class
 Variables should be declared as fields of a class only if they are

required for use in more than one method or if the app needs to save
their values between calls to the class’s methods.

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7.4.3 Assembling strings with Concatenation
 string concatenation allows you to combine strings using + .
 When one of the + operator’s operands is a string, the other is

implicitly converted to a string, then the two are concatenated.

 If a bool is concatenated with a string, the bool is converted to the

string "True" or "False".

 Every object has a ToString method that returns a string

representation of that object.

 When an object is concatenated with a string, the object’s ToString

method is called implicitly to obtain the string representation of the

object. If the object is null, an empty string is written.

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7.4.6 Implementing Method Maximum by Reusing
Method Math.Max
 The entire body of our maximum method could also be implemented
with nested calls to Math.Max, as follows:
 return Math.Max(x, Math.Max(y, z));
 Before any method can be called, the .NET runtime evaluates all its
arguments to determine their values.
 Math.Max(y, z) is evaluated first, then the result is passed as the

second argument to the other call to Math.Max

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7.5 Notes on Using Methods
 Three ways to call a method:
 Using a method name by itself to call a method of the same class
 Maximum(number1, number2, number3)
 Using a reference to an object, followed by the member-access
operator (.) and the method name to call a non-static method of
the referenced object
 account1.Deposit(depositAmount)
 Using the class name and the member-access operator (.) to call a
static method of a class
 Console.ReadLine()
 Math.Sqrt(900.0) © 2018 Pearson Education, Ltd. All
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7.5 Notes on Using Methods
 Three
ways to return control to the statement that calls a
method.
 Reaching the end of the method.
 A return statement without a value.
 A return statement with a value.

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7.5 Notes on Using Methods (cont.)
 A static method or property can call only other static methods or
properties of the same class directly and can manipulate only static
variables in the same class directly.
 To access a class’s non-static members, a static method or property

must use a reference to an object of that class.

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7.10 Scope of Declarations
 The scope of a declaration is the portion of the app that can refer to the
declared entity by its unqualified name.
 The basic scope rules are as follows:

 The scope of a parameter declaration is the body of the method in which the
declaration appears.
 The scope of a local-variable declaration is from the point at which the
declaration appears to the end of the block containing the declaration.
 The scope of a non-static method, property or field of a class is the entire body of
the class.
 If a local variable or parameter in a method has the same name as a
field, the field is hidden until the block terminates (scope hole).
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7.12 Method Overloading
 Methods of the same name can be declared in the same class, or
overloaded, as long as they have different sets of parameters.
 When an overloaded method is called, the C# compiler selects the

appropriate method by examining the number, types and order of the

arguments in the call.
 Method overloading is used to create several methods with the same

name that perform the same tasks, but on different types or numbers
of arguments.

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7.12.1 Declaring Overloaded Methods
 Class MethodOverload (Fig. 7.10) includes two overloaded versions of
a method called Square.
 Although these methods have the same name and similar parameter

lists and bodies, you can think of them simply as different methods.
 It may help to think of the method names as “Square of int” and

“Square of double,” respectively

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7.12.2 Distinguishing Between Overloaded Methods
 The compiler distinguishes overloaded methods by their signature—a
combination of the method’s name and the number, types and order of
its parameters.

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7.12.3 Return Types of Overloaded Methods
 Method calls cannot be distinguished by return type.
 If in a class you define overloaded methods with the following headers:

 int Square(int x)
 double Square(int x)
 The compiler generates the following error for the second Square
method:
 Type 'MethodOverloadError' already defines a member called 'Square' with the
same parameter types

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7.13 Optional Parameters
 Methods can have optional parameters that allow the calling method to
vary the number of arguments to pass.
 An optional parameter specifies a default value that’s assigned to the

parameter if the optional argument is omitted.

 You can create methods with one or more optional parameters.
 All optional parameters must be placed to the right of the method’s

non-optional parameters.

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7.13 Optional Parameters (Cont.)
 When a parameter has a default value, the caller has the option of
passing that particular argument.
 For example, the method header

 static int Power(int baseValue, int exponentValue = 2)

 specifies an optional second parameter.
 Any call to Power must pass at least an argument for the parameter

baseValue, or a compilation error occurs.

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7.13 Optional Parameters (Cont.)
 Optionally, a second argument (for the exponentValue parameter)
can be passed to Power. Consider the following calls to Power:
 Power()
 Power(10)
 Power(10, 3)
 The first generates a compilation error because this method requires a
minimum of one argument.
 The second is valid because one argument (10) is being passed—the

optional exponentValue is not specified in the method call.

 The last call is also valid—10 is passed as the required argument and 3

is passed as the optional argument.

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7.15 C# 6 Expression Bodied Methods
 If the expression to the right of => does not have a value (e.g., a call to a
method that returns void), the expression-bodied method must return
void.
 Similarly, a read-only property can be implemented as an expression-

bodied property.
 The following reimplements the IsNoFaultState property in Fig.

6.11 to return the result of a logical expression:

 public bool IsNoFaultState =>
State == "MA" || State == "NJ" || State == "NY" || State == "PA";

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7.16 Recursion
 A recursive method is a method that calls itself.
 A recursive method is capable of solving only the base case(s).
 Each method call divides the problem into two conceptual pieces: a

piece that the method knows how to do and a recursive call, or

recursion step that solves a smaller problem.
 A sequence of returns ensues until the original method call returns the

result to the caller.

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