Object Class

Article
01/16/2013

[This documentation is for preview only, and is subject to change in later releases. Blank topics are included as placeholders.]

Supports all classes in the .NET Framework class hierarchy and provides low-level services to derived classes. This is the ultimate base class of all classes in the .NET Framework; it is the root of the type hierarchy.

Inheritance Hierarchy

System..::..Object
All classes, structures, enumerations, and delegates.

Namespace: System
Assembly: mscorlib (in mscorlib.dll)

Syntax

'Declaration
<SerializableAttribute> _
Public Class Object

[SerializableAttribute]
public class Object

[SerializableAttribute]
public ref class Object

[<SerializableAttribute>]
type Object =  class end

public class Object

The Object type exposes the following members.

Constructors

	Name	Description
	Object	Initializes a new instance of the Object class.

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Methods

	Name	Description
	Equals(Object)	Determines whether the specified Object is equal to the current Object.
	Equals(Object, Object)	Determines whether the specified object instances are considered equal.
	Finalize	Allows an object to try to free resources and perform other cleanup operations before it is reclaimed by garbage collection.
	GetHashCode	Serves as a hash function for a particular type.
	GetType	Gets the Type of the current instance.
	MemberwiseClone	Creates a shallow copy of the current Object.
	ReferenceEquals	Determines whether the specified Object instances are the same instance.
	ToString	Returns a string that represents the current object.

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Remarks

Languages typically do not require a class to declare inheritance from Object because the inheritance is implicit.

Because all classes in the .NET Framework are derived from Object, every method defined in the Object class is available in all objects in the system. Derived classes can and do override some of these methods, including:

Equals - Supports comparisons between objects.
Finalize - Performs cleanup operations before an object is automatically reclaimed.
GetHashCode - Generates a number corresponding to the value of the object to support the use of a hash table.
ToString - Manufactures a human-readable text string that describes an instance of the class.

Thread Safety

Public static (Shared in Visual Basic) members of this type are thread safe. Instance members are not guaranteed to be thread-safe.

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