Caching in C#/.Net

Question

Hello community,

I wanted to ask you what is the best approach to implement a cache in C#? Is there a possibility by using given .Net-classes or something like that? Perhaps something like a dictionary that will remove some entries if it gets too large but whose entries won't be removed by the garbage collector?

Thanks in advance

Sebastian

Answer 1

You could use a Hashtable

it has very fast lookups, no key collisions and your data will not garbage collected

Answer 2

If you're using asp.net you could use the Cache class (System.Web.Caching).

Here is a good helper class: link text

If you mean caching in a windows form app, it depends on what you're trying to do, and where you're trying to cache the data.

We've implemented a Cache behind a webservice for certain methods
(Using the System.Web.Caching object.).

However you might also want to look at the Caching Application Block. (See here)
Which is part of the Enterprise Library for .NET Framework 2.0

Answer 3

If you are looking to Cache something in ASP.Net then I would look at the Cache class. For example

Hashtable menuTable = new Hashtable(); 
menuTable.add("Home","default.aspx"); 
Cache["menu"] = menuTable;

Then to retrieve it again

Hashtable menuTable = (Hashtable)Cache["menu"];