Why can I initialize a List like an array in C#?

Today I was surprised to find that in C# I can do:

List<int> a = new List<int> { 1, 2, 3 };

Why can I do this? What constructor is called? How can I do this with my own classes? I know that this is the way to initialize arrays but arrays are language items and Lists are simple objects ...

This is part of the collection initializer syntax in .NET. You can use this syntax on any collection you create as long as:

• It implements IEnumerable (preferably IEnumerable<T>)

• It has a method named Add(...)

What happens is the default constructor is called, and then Add(...) is called for each member of the initializer.

Thus, these two blocks are roughly identical:

List<int> a = new List<int> { 1, 2, 3 };

And

List<int> temp = new List<int>();
temp.Add(1);
temp.Add(2);
temp.Add(3);
List<int> a = temp;

You can call an alternate constructor if you want, for example to prevent over-sizing the List<T> during growing, etc:

// Notice, calls the List constructor that takes an int arg
// for initial capacity, then Add()'s three items.
List<int> a = new List<int>(3) { 1, 2, 3, }

Note that the Add() method need not take a single item, for example the Add() method for Dictionary<TKey, TValue> takes two items:

var grades = new Dictionary<string, int>
    {
        { "Suzy", 100 },
        { "David", 98 },
        { "Karen", 73 }
    };

Is roughly identical to:

var temp = new Dictionary<string, int>();
temp.Add("Suzy", 100);
temp.Add("David", 98);
temp.Add("Karen", 73);
var grades = temp;

So, to add this to your own class, all you need do, as mentioned, is implement IEnumerable (again, preferably IEnumerable<T>) and create one or more Add() methods:

public class SomeCollection<T> : IEnumerable<T>
{
    // implement Add() methods appropriate for your collection
    public void Add(T item)
    {
        // your add logic    
    }

    // implement your enumerators for IEnumerable<T> (and IEnumerable)
    public IEnumerator<T> GetEnumerator()
    {
        // your implementation
    }

    IEnumerator IEnumerable.GetEnumerator()
    {
        return GetEnumerator();
    }
}

Then you can use it just like the BCL collections do:

public class MyProgram
{
    private SomeCollection<int> _myCollection = new SomeCollection<int> { 13, 5, 7 };    

    // ...
}

(For more information, see the MSDN)

It is so called syntactic sugar.

List<T> is the "simple" class, but compiler gives a special treatment to it in order to make your life easier.

This one is so called collection initializer. You need to implement IEnumerable<T> and Add method.

According to the C# Version 3.0 Specification "The collection object to which a collection initializer is applied must be of a type that implements System.Collections.Generic.ICollection for exactly one T."

However, this information appears to be inaccurate as of this writing; see Eric Lippert's clarification in the comments below.

It works thanks to collection initializers which basically require the collection to implement an Add method and that will do the work for you.

Another cool thing about collection initializers is that you can have multiple overloads of Add method and you can call them all in the same initializer! For example this works:

public class MyCollection<T> : IEnumerable<T>
{
    public void Add(T item, int number)
    {

    }
    public void Add(T item, string text) 
    {

    }
    public bool Add(T item) //return type could be anything
    {

    }
}

var myCollection = new MyCollection<bool> 
{
    true,
    { false, 0 },
    { true, "" },
    false
};

It calls the correct overloads. Also, it looks for just the method with name Add, the return type could be anything.

The array like syntax is being turned in a series of Add() calls.

To see this in a much more interesting example, consider the following code in which I do two interesting things that sound first illegal in C#, 1) setting a readonly property, 2) setting a list with a array like initializer.

public class MyClass
{	
    public MyClass()
    {	
        _list = new List<string>();
    }
    private IList<string> _list;
    public IList<string> MyList 
    { 
        get
        { 
            return _list;
        }
    }
}
//In some other method
var sample = new MyClass
{
    MyList = {"a", "b"}
};

This code will work perfectly, although 1) MyList is readonly and 2) I set a list with array initializer.

The reason why this works, is because in code that is part of an object intializer the compiler always turns any {} like syntax to a series of Add() calls which are perfectly legal even on a readonly field.