Sept 27, 2018 / by Kamlesh Bhor /14038

This article is suited for beginners to intermediate programmers or anyone who would like to gain familiarity with the C# language. This article will help you get a quick head-start with C# language.

To get started, you will need a compiler and an editor. There are several options for obtaining a compiler to write C# programs. A free option is to download the .NET Frameworks SDK and use Notepad. Of course there are many editor and IDE options available, so see the Tools section to select the option that's right for you. Most of the examples in these tutorials run as console programs. Microsoft Visual Studio is also available in multiple versions as well as a free download for Visual Studio Express.

C# is a very powerful programming langauge by Microsoft. Its first version C# 1.0 released by Microsoft in June 2000 as part of its .NET framework. C# inherits many of the featurs of C, C++, Java and Visual Basic. In short C# is a general-purpose, type-safe, platform independent and robust object oriented programming language. The most current version of C#, as of this writting, is 7.3 which is released in 2018. C# has been derived from the C programming language and it has many features similar to C programming language. Similar to Java, it is object-oriented and comes with an extensive class library, supports exception handling, multiple types of polymorphism & interfaces.

This article assumes that you have installed Microsoft Visual Studio 2012 or later. Infact Visual Studio 2012, like its predecessor versions of Visual Studio, is a tool-rich development environment, providing you every tool that you may need to develop small or large scale C# projects.

C# is a strongly typed language. It means, that you cannot use variable without data types. Data types tell the compiler that which type of data is used for processing. C# provides two types of data types: Value types and Reference types.

A Value type data type stores copy of the value whereas the Reference type data types stores the address of the value. C sharp provides great range of predefined data types but it also gives the way to create user defined data types.

In C Language, char datatype uses ASCII code. ASCII values will be up to 255. ASCII will use 1 byte for 1 character. In C#, char and string datatype will uses UNICODE. UNICODE values will be up to 65535. UNICODE supports English and other popular languages like French, Latin, Greek etc. UNICODE will use 2 bytes for 1 character.

Object class is the super class in .Net. The datatypes and remaining classes are derived or created from Object class. It is in a System namespace . Namespace is collection of a classes and interfaces. In namespace hierarchy first namespace is System.

Operators are used for building expressions in C#. To calculate the value of variable or perform operation in variable you will have to make proper expression. These expressions are made using C# operators.

Operators are very useful thing in computing value. While writing a program, you need various types of operators to calculate value. These operators are categorized as different categories in C sharp tutorial that performs specific task. C# provides wide range of operators as follows:

Write() is used to display text in console window. WriteLine() is used to display text or result in console window and after that cursor will go to next line. Read() is used to read one character from console window. ReadLine() is used to read set of characters from console window.

C# programs contains following sections:

Using is called directive. It is used to import predefined namespaces in c# application. In C# application file name will be used as a namespace name. By default it contains one class. Static is used to preserve memory for the method, so that it can be stored and will be executed. Void is an empty datatype which does not returns anything. Main() is the entry point for the program. Program execution starts with a main(). In C#, main() contains one argument. If c# program is executed at command prompt then to send the values to the program then command line argument is used.

using System;

namespace HelloWorld
{
    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            Console.WriteLine("Hello World");
            Console.ReadLine();
        }
    }
}

using System;

namespace HelloWorld
{
    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            string s;

            Console.WriteLine("Enter Name:");
            s = Console.ReadLine();
            Console.WriteLine("Name is: " + s);
            Console.Read();
        }
    }
}

C# contains two types of notations. They are pascal notation and camel notation. In C# namespace, class and method names will be in pascal notations(Title case). And variable names will be in camel notation. Console class in System namespace contains static methods. They can be accessed with the class name. Dot(.) is called member access operator. It is used to access variables and methods in the class. In C# the line should be terminated with ';'. To execute the program, press F5 or click on start debugging icon in the tool bar.

using System;

namespace Addition
{
    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            int a, b;
            Console.WriteLine("Enter Values:");
            a = int.Parse(Console.ReadLine());
            b = int.Parse(Console.ReadLine());
            Console.WriteLine("Sum is: " + a+b);
            Console.Read();
        }
    }
}

ReadLine() in a Console class will read any data in the string format.

int.Parse():- It is a predefined structure contains Parse(). It is used to convert string type data to int.

convert.ToInt32:- Convert class contains ToInt32 method. It is used to convert string to int.

using System;

namespace EvenOdd
{
    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            int a;
            Console.WriteLine("Enter Value:");
            a = int.Parse(Console.ReadLine());
            if (a % 2 == 0)
                Console.WriteLine("Even Number");
            else
                Console.WriteLine("Odd Number");
            Console.Read();
        }
    }
}

using System;

namespace LargestValue
{
    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            int a, b, c;
            Console.WriteLine("Enter Values:");
            a = int.Parse(Console.ReadLine());
            b = int.Parse(Console.ReadLine());
            c = int.Parse(Console.ReadLine());
            if (a > b && a > c)
                Console.WriteLine("Biggest Value : " +a);
            else if(b>c)
                Console.WriteLine("Biggest Value : " + b);
            else
                Console.WriteLine("Biggest Value : " + c);
            Console.Read();
        }
    }
}

using System;

namespace PrintCharacter
{
    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            int a;
            Console.WriteLine("Enter Digit:");
            a = int.Parse(Console.ReadLine());

            switch (a)
            {
                case 0: Console.WriteLine("Zero");
                    break;
                case 1: Console.WriteLine("One");
                    break;
                case 2: Console.WriteLine("Two");
                    break;
                default: Console.WriteLine("Invalid");
                    break;
            }            
            Console.Read();
        }
    }
}

using System;

namespace Table
{
    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            int a;
            Console.WriteLine("Enter value:");
            a = int.Parse(Console.ReadLine());

            for (int i = 1; i <= 10; i++)
            {
                Console.WriteLine(a + "*" + i + "=" + a * i);
            }
            Console.Read();
        }
    }
}

using System;

namespace DoWhile
{
    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            int a=1;
            do
            {
                Console.WriteLine(a);
                a = a + 1;
            }
            while (a <= 10);
            Console.Read();
        }
    }
}

Boxing means converting value type to reference type. UnBoxing means converting reference type to value type.

using System;

namespace Boxing_Unboxing
{
    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            int a=123;
            object s;
            s = a;
            Console.WriteLine(s);
            int b;
            b = Convert.ToInt32(s);
            Console.WriteLine(b);
            Console.Read();
        }
    }
}

int datatype is structure. It is a value type datatype and will use the stack memory. Object datatype is a class. It is reference type datatype. It will use heap memory. s=a means the reference or memory address of the value will be store in s.

b=Convert.ToInt32(s): The value in the memory address of reference in s will be stored in variable b.

C# contains two types of comments:

In this way, we learned introduction to C# and some basic programs which will help you to quick start with your journey in to C# world.

Article By Kamlesh Bhor

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