Chapter 9: Value Types

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Overview

In this chapter, you will learn how to:

• Distinguish between reference and value types

• Work with structures

• Work with enumerations

In Part 2, you learned about object-oriented programming and how to apply it within .NET. You’ve seen how many data types within .NET are represented by classes, and you’ve learned how to create and use your own classes. However, not every data type in .NET is a class, and now you’re going to meet the other fundamental building block of .NET types—the value type.

In this chapter, you’ll discover what value types are and how they differ from the reference types you’ve already met. You will also meet two important value types—structures and enumerations—that will be useful in your own code.