This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
This chapter is from the book
Working with Operators
C# supports a wide variety of operators, but we only cover the more commonly used ones. An operator is a special symbol that indicates which operation to perform in an expression. All the C# predefined types support operators, although not all types support the same operators.
Table 3.8 shows all the C# operators in order of precedence. Within each category, operators have equal precedence.
Table 3.8. Operators and Operator Precedence in C#
Category |
Operators |
Primary |
x.y f(x) a[x] x++ x-- new typeof checked unchecked -> |
Unary |
+ - ! ~ ++x --x (T)x true false & sizeof |
Multiplicative |
* / % |
Additive |
+ - |
Shift |
<< >> |
Relational and Type Testing |
< > <= >= is as |
Equality |
== != |
Logical AND |
& |
Logical XOR |
^ |
Logical OR |
¦ |
Conditional AND |
&& |
Conditional OR |
¦¦ |
Conditional |
?: |
Assignment |
= += -= *= /= %= &= ¦= ^= <<= >>= |
Null-Coalescing |
?? |
Lambda |
=> |
Arithmetic and Assignment Operators
You have already seen the assignment operator (=) in many of the previous examples. This operator simply stores the value of the right operand in the variable indicated by its left operand. Both operands must be the same type or the right operand must be implicitly convertible to the type of the left operand.
C# provides arithmetic operators that support the standard mathematical operations of addition (+), subtraction (–), multiplication (*), and division (/). Subtle differences exist between the behavior of the C# arithmetic operators and the arithmetic rules you learned in school. In particular, integer division behaves a bit differently depending on the data types you are dividing. When dividing one integer by another, the result is an integer. Any remainder is discarded, and the result is rounded toward zero. To obtain the remainder of an integer division, you must use the modulus operator (%).
C# also supports a compound assignment operator, which combines an arithmetic operation and an assignment in a single operator. A corresponding operation (+=, –=, *=, /=) exists for each of the standard arithmetic operators and the modulus operator (%=), which combine addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, and modulus division with assignment.
For example, suppose you need to increment a variable by one. Using the standard arithmetic operators, such an action would typically look like this:
i = i + 1;
However, by using the addition compound assignment operator, this operation could be performed like this:
i += 1;
Try It Yourself: Arithmetic Operators
To examine how the assignment, addition, compound assignment, and increment and decrement operators behave, follow these steps.
- Create a new console application.
In the Main method of the Program.cs file, enter the following code:
int i = 20; Console.WriteLine("i = {0}", i); i = i + 1; Console.WriteLine("i = {0}", i); i += 2; Console.WriteLine("i = {0}", i); i -= 3; Console.WriteLine("i = {0}", i);Run the application by pressing Ctrl+F5; you should see the following lines in the console window, as shown in Figure 3.3.
Figure 3.3. Output of working with the arithmetic operators.
- Press any key to close the console and return to Visual Studio.
)
Relational Operators
The relational operators, shown in Table 3.9, are used when comparing two values and result in a Boolean value.
Table 3.9. Relational Operators in C#
Name |
Operator |
Expression |
Result |
Equals |
== |
x == 20y == 30 |
truefalse |
Not equals |
!= |
x != 20y != 30 |
falsetrue |
Greater than |
> |
x > yy > x |
truefalse |
Greater than or equals |
>= |
x >= yy >= x |
truefalse |
Less than |
< |
x < yy < x |
falsetrue |
Less than or equals |
<= |
x <= yy <= x |
falsetrue |
Assuming x = 20 and y = 10. |
In many programming languages, the assignment and equality operators are easily confused because they use the same symbol. This confusion can result in accidental assignments, which remains one of the more common programming mistakes today. To help minimize the possibility for confusion, C# defines a different operator for equality (==).
Logical Operators
The logical operators, shown in Table 3.10, evaluate Boolean expressions that result in either true or false.
Table 3.10. Logical Operators in C#
Name |
Operator |
Expression |
Result |
And (Conditional) |
&& |
(x == 20) && (y == 30) |
false; both expressions must be true |
And (Logical) |
& |
(x == 20) & (y == 30) |
false; both expressions must be true |
Or (Conditional) |
¦¦ |
(x == 20) ¦¦ (y == 30) |
true; either or both expressions must be true |
Or (Logical) |
¦ |
(x == 20) ¦ (y == 30) |
True; either or both expressions must be true |
Or (Exclusive) |
^ |
(x == 20) ^ (y == 30) |
true; the expressions are both different |
Not |
! |
!(x == 30) |
true; the expression must be false |
Assuming x = 20 and y = 10. |
The rules for the logical operators can be easily summarized, assuming an x and y that are Boolean expressions, as shown in Table 3.11.
Table 3.11. Logical Operators Truth Table
X |
Y |
X && Y |
X ¦¦ Y |
X ^ Y |
true |
true |
true |
true |
false |
true |
false |
false |
true |
true |
false |
true |
false |
true |
true |
false |
false |
false |
false |
false |
Conditional Operator
The conditional operator (also called a ternary operator, or ternary if, because it takes three terms) is useful for writing concise expressions and evaluates a condition returning one of two values depending on the result.
The conditional operator has the following form:
condition ? consequence : alternative
When condition is true, the consequence is evaluated and becomes the result. However, when condition is false, the alternative is evaluated and becomes the result instead.