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Why Dynamic Programming?

Most C# developers use multiple tools in a single application to accomplish complex tasks. If you’re writing WPF desktop applications, you’re using C# and XAML. It is quite possible that you might find some open source code that solves a problem, but it might be written in another language such as VB or F#. One of the benefits of .NET since its inception is the ability to have cross-language interoperability and the runtime is even called the “Common Language” Runtime (CLR). In recent years, Microsoft has created dynamic languages, such as IronRuby and IronPython, but developers don’t have an easy way to perform interop with dynamic languages. If you have this need, then you’ll welcome the ease with which C# dynamic programming makes interop between C# and dynamic languages possible.

When performing reflection to run a method on an object, there are several hoops to jump through, including obtaining a reference to an object type, getting a reference to a member info object, determining the type of bindings to use, and then invoking the member. While reflection has an undeniable coolness factor, it still feels like a hack and that’s where C# 4.0 dynamic methods can help. Later in this article, I’ll show you how to just call the object member.

Performing COM interop with C# has always been cumbersome; partly because of the need to write extra syntax for conversions, optional parameters, and more. This has left some C# developers with a touch of VB envy because VB has easier COM interop support. One of the purposes of dynamic programming in C# is to help the C# programmer write cleaner syntax in COM interop scenarios.