Impworks.Utils

A collection of useful helper methods.

Installation

To install, use the following Package Manager command:

PM> Install-Package Impworks.Utils

Usage

Add the using directive with the required namespace to the top of the file where you intend to use a helper method.

If you work with Resharper, it will suggest adding the namespace automatically.

The methods

The package provides the following methods, split into logical parts.

• Strings

  Parsing to various types (primitives supported by default):

  "123".Parse<int>()// 123"hello".TryParse<int?>()// null"12345".TryParse<MyType>(MyParseFunc)// MyType"1,2,test,3".TryParseList<int>()// 1, 2, 3"1;2;test;3".TryParseList<int>(separator:";")// 1, 2, 3"1".TryParse<MyEnum?>();// MyEnum or null

  Coalesce:

  StringHelper.Coalesce(null,"","test")// test

  Ends/starts with substring:

  "hello world".StartsWithPart("hello test",5)// true"a test".EndsWithPart("b TEST",4,ignoreCase:true)// true

  Transliteration from Russian:

  StringHelper.Transliterate("Привет мир","_")// "Privet_mir"

  string.Join as extension:

  new[]{1,2,3}.JoinString(", ")// "1, 2, 3"

• Enumerable

  Distinct by projection:

  new[]{1,2,3}.DistinctBy(x =>x%2)// 1, 2

  Conditional ordering:

  new[]{4,6,1}.OrderBy(x =>x,isDescending)// true => 6, 4, 1, false => 1, 4, 6new[]{obj1,obj2}.OrderBy("FieldA.FieldB",isDescending)// orders by field or path

  Partitioning:

  new[]{1,2,3,4,5,6}.PartitionBySize(2)// [1, 2], [3, 4], [5, 6]new[]{1,2,3,4,5,6}.PartitionByCount(2)=>[1,2,3],[4,5,6]

  Recursive selection and application:

  new[]{treeRoot}.SelectRecursively(x =>x.Children)// selects all children in a flat listnew[]{treeRoot}.ApplyRecursively(x =>x.Children, x =>x.Value=1)// sets Value = 1 on all children

  Destructuring sequences:

  var(a,b)=new[]{1,2,3}.First2();// a = 1, b = 2var(c,d,e,f)=new[]{"foo","bar"}.First4OrDefault();// e, f = null

• Expressions

  Expression combinations (useful for LINQ):

  ExprHelper.And<Foo>(x =>x.A==1, x =>x.B==2)// x => x.A == 1 && x.B == 2
  ExprHelper.Or<Foo>(x =>x.A==1, x =>x.B==2)// x => x.A == 1 || x.B == 2

  Partial application (for Func and Action up to 8 arguments):

  ExprHelper.Apply((intx,inty)=>x+y,10)// Expr for (int x) => x + 10

• Enums

  Captions from Description attribute:

  enumLanguage{[Description("C#")]CSharp,[Description("C++")]CPlusPlus}EnumHelper.GetEnumDescriptions<Language>()// { Language.CSharp = "C#", Language.CPlusPlus = "C++" }

  Case-insensitive IsDefined:

  EnumHelper.IsDefined<Language>("csharp")// true

• Exceptions

  Fluent exception ignoring (with async versions too):

  Try.Do(()=>SomeStuff());// does not throwTry.Get(()=>GetAnInt())// returns 0 on exception
  Try.Get(()=>GetAnInt(),123)// returns 123 on exception

• Comparisons

  Min and Max for all IComparable's:

  CompareHelper.Min("b","a","c")// "a"
  CompareHelper.Max(DateTime.Parse("2024-01-01"),DateTime.Parse("2023-02-01"))// 2024-01-01

• Random

  Random values:

  RandomHelper.Int(1,100)// 42
  RandomHelper.Float()// 0.1337
  RandomHelper.Sign()// -1 or 1
  RandomHelper.DoubleNormal()// normal distribution around 0.5 limited to 0..1

  Random picks:

  RandomHelper.Pick(1,2,3,4,5)// 4
  RandomHelper.PickWeighted(new[]{"a","test","blablabla"}, x =>x.Length)// likely "blablabla"new[]{1,2,3,4,5}.PickRandom()// optionally accepts a weight function too

  Shuffle:

  new [] { 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 }.Shuffle() // something like 4, 2, 1, 5, 3
  

• Dictionary

  Value retrieval:

  vardict=newDictionary<string,int>{["hello"]=1,["world"]=2};dict.TryGetValue("hello")// 1
  dict.TryGetValue("test")// 0
  dict.TryGetValue("foo",null,"hello")// 1
  dict.TryGetNullableValue("test")// null

• Urls

  URL parts combination:

  UrlHelper.Combine("http://a.com/foo","bar/","/test")// http://a.com/foo/bar/test

  Query generation from an object (accepts anonymous objects, Dictionary and JObject):

  UrlHelper.GetQuery(new{A=1,B="hello"})// "A=1&B=hello"
  UrlHelper.GetQuery(new{A=new[]{1,2,3}})// "A=1&A=2&A=3"

• Tasks (.NET Standard 2.0 only)

  Parallel awaiting (strong typing, up to 7 values):

  var(i,str)=awaitTaskHelper.GetAll(GetIntAsync(),GetStringAsync());

  Async ID-based locker:

  varlocker=newLocker<int>();using(awaitlocker.AcquireAsync(123))// do stuff

• XML

  Attributes:

  varxml=XElement.Parse(@"<test a=""1337"" b=""true"" />");xml.Attr("a")// "1337"
  xml.ParseAttr<int>("a")// 1337
  xml.ParseAttr<bool>("b")// true
  xml.TryParseAttr<bool?>("a")// null

  Less verbose serialization with a cleaner resulting XML:

  varobj=newMyObject{Foo="hello",Bar=(int?)null};XmlHelper.Serialize(obj)// <MyObject><Foo>Hello</Foo><Bar /></MyObject>
  XmlHelper.Serialize(obj,clean:false);// lots of junk: xml declaration, namespaces, nil'sXmlHelper.Deserialize<MyObject>("...")// gets it back