The table in Appendix L, Simple Types, lists the thirteen simple types in C#. Like its predecessor languages C and C++, C# requires all variables to have a type. For this reason, C# is referred to as a strongly typed language.
In C and C++, programmers frequently have to write separate versions of applications to support different computer platforms, because the simple types are not guaranteed to be identical from computer to computer. For example, an int value on one machine might be represented by 16 bits (2 bytes) of memory, while an int value on another machine might be represented by 32 bits (4 bytes) of memory. In C#, int values are always 32 bits (4 bytes). In fact, all C# numeric types have fixed sizes, as is shown in Appendix L, Simple Types.
Each type in Appendix L is listed with its size in bits (there are eight bits to a byte) and its range of values. Because the designers of C# want it to be maximally portable, they use internationally recognized standards for both character formats (Unicode; for more information, visit www.unicode.org) and floating-point numbers (IEEE 754; for more information, visit grouper.ieee.org/groups/754/).
Recall from Section 4.5 that variables of simple types declared outside of a method as fields of a class are automatically assigned default values unless explicitly initialized. Instance variables of types char, byte, sbyte, short, ushort, int, uint, long, ulong, float, double, and decimal are all given the value 0 by default. Instance variables of type bool are given the value false by default. Similarly, reference type instance variables are initialized by default to the value null.
(Optional) Software Engineering Case Study Identifying Class Attributes in the ATM System |
Preface
Index
Introduction to Computers, the Internet and Visual C#
Introduction to the Visual C# 2005 Express Edition IDE
Introduction to C# Applications
Introduction to Classes and Objects
Control Statements: Part 1
Control Statements: Part 2
Methods: A Deeper Look
Arrays
Classes and Objects: A Deeper Look
Object-Oriented Programming: Inheritance
Polymorphism, Interfaces & Operator Overloading
Exception Handling
Graphical User Interface Concepts: Part 1
Graphical User Interface Concepts: Part 2
Multithreading
Strings, Characters and Regular Expressions
Graphics and Multimedia
Files and Streams
Extensible Markup Language (XML)
Database, SQL and ADO.NET
ASP.NET 2.0, Web Forms and Web Controls
Web Services
Networking: Streams-Based Sockets and Datagrams
Searching and Sorting
Data Structures
Generics
Collections
Appendix A. Operator Precedence Chart
Appendix B. Number Systems
Appendix C. Using the Visual Studio 2005 Debugger
Appendix D. ASCII Character Set
Appendix E. Unicode®
Appendix F. Introduction to XHTML: Part 1
Appendix G. Introduction to XHTML: Part 2
Appendix H. HTML/XHTML Special Characters
Appendix I. HTML/XHTML Colors
Appendix J. ATM Case Study Code
Appendix K. UML 2: Additional Diagram Types
Appendix L. Simple Types
Index