A dictionary where value is an anonymous type in C#

Question

Is it possible in C# 3.net to create a System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary<TKey, TValue> where TKey is unconditioned class and TValue - an anonymous class with a number of properties, for example - database column name and it's localized name.

Something like this:

new { ID = 1, Name = new { Column = "Dollar", Localized = "Доллар" } }

Answer 1

You can't declare such a dictionary type directly (there are kludges but these are for entertainment and novelty purposes only), but if your data is coming from an IEnumerable or IQueryable source, you can get one using the LINQ ToDictionary operator and projecting out the required key and (anonymously typed) value from the sequence elements:

var intToAnon = sourceSequence.ToDictionary(
    e => e.Id,
    e => new { e.Column, e.Localized });

Answer 2

As itowlson said, you can't declare such a beast, but you can indeed create one:

 static IDictionary<TKey, TValue> NewDictionary<TKey, TValue>(TKey key, TValue value)
 {
  return new Dictionary<TKey, TValue>();
 }

 static void Main(string[] args)
 {
  var dict = NewDictionary(new {ID = 1}, new { Column = "Dollar", Localized = "Доллар" });
 }

It's not clear why you'd actually want to use code like this.

Answer 3

You can do a refection

public static class ObjectExtensions
{
    /// <summary>
    /// Turn anonymous object to dictionary
    /// </summary>
    /// <param name="data"></param>
    /// <returns></returns>
    public static IDictionary<string, object> ToDictionary(this object data)
    {
        var attr = BindingFlags.Public | BindingFlags.Instance;
        var dict = new Dictionary<string, object>();
        foreach (var property in data.GetType().GetProperties(attr))
        {
            if (property.CanRead)
            {
                dict.Add(property.Name, property.GetValue(data, null));
            }
        }
        return dict;
    }
}