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When to Use Generic Collections

Using generic collections is generally recommended, because you gain the immediate benefit of type safety without having to derive from a base collection type and implement type-specific members. Generic collection types also generally perform better than the corresponding nongeneric collection types (and better than types that are derived from nongeneric base collection types) when the collection elements are value types, because with generics there is no need to box the elements.

For programs that target the .NET Framework version 4 or later, you should use the generic collection classes in the System.Collections.Concurrent namespace when multiple threads might be adding or removing items from the collection concurrently.

The following generic types correspond to existing collection types:

Additional Types

Several generic collection types do not have nongeneric counterparts. They include the following:

LINQ to Objects

The LINQ to Objects feature enables you to use LINQ queries to access in-memory objects as long as the object type implements the System.Collections.IEnumerable or System.Collections.Generic.IEnumerable<T> interface. LINQ queries provide a common pattern for accessing data; are typically more concise and readable than standard foreach loops; and provide filtering, ordering and grouping capabilities. LINQ queries can also improve performance. For more information, see LINQ to Objects and Parallel LINQ (PLINQ).

Additional Functionality

Some of the generic types have functionality that is not found in the nongeneric collection types. For example, the List<T> class, which corresponds to the nongeneric ArrayList class, has a number of methods that accept generic delegates, such as the Predicate<T> delegate that allows you to specify methods for searching the list, the Action<T> delegate that represents methods that act on each element of the list, and the Converter<TInput, TOutput> delegate that lets you define conversions between types.

The List<T> class allows you to specify your own IComparer<T> generic interface implementations for sorting and searching the list. The SortedDictionary<TKey, TValue> and SortedList<TKey, TValue> classes also have this capability. In addition, these classes let you specify comparers when the collection is created. In similar fashion, the Dictionary<TKey, TValue> and KeyedCollection<TKey, TItem> classes let you specify your own equality comparers.

See Also

Other Resources

Commonly Used Collection Types

Generics in the .NET Framework