Delegates

Delegates

A delegate is a type-safe reference to a method, letting you pass methods around as values — as parameters, return values, or stored in variables. You declare a delegate type describing the method signature it can point to, then assign any matching method to it. Calling the delegate invokes whichever method it currently references.

Note: Delegates are the foundation that lambda expressions, Func<>/Action<>, and events are all built on.

Example: Delegates

using System;

delegate int Operation(int a, int b);

class Program
{
    static int Add(int a, int b) => a + b;
    static int Multiply(int a, int b) => a * b;

    static void Main(string[] args)
    {
        Operation op = Add;
        Console.WriteLine(op(3, 4));

        op = Multiply;
        Console.WriteLine(op(3, 4));
    }
}