C# 5.0 Pocket Reference

Strings and Characters

C#’s char type (aliasing the System.Char type) represents a Unicode character and occupies two bytes. A char literal is specified inside single quotes:

char c = 'A';       // Simple character

Escape sequences express characters that cannot be expressed or interpreted literally. An escape sequence is a backslash followed by a character with a special meaning. For example:

char newLine = '\n';
char backSlash = '\\';

The escape sequence characters are:

Char	Meaning	Value
\'	Single quote	0x0027
\"	Double quote	0x0022
\\	Backslash	0x005C
\0	Null	0x0000
\a	Alert	0x0007
\b	Backspace	0x0008
\f	Form feed	0x000C
\n	New line	0x000A
\r	Carriage return	0x000D
\t	Horizontal tab	0x0009
\v	Vertical tab	0x000B

The \u (or \x) escape sequence lets you specify any Unicode character via its four-digit hexadecimal code:

char copyrightSymbol = '\u00A9';
char omegaSymbol     = '\u03A9';
char newLine         = '\u000A';

An implicit conversion from a char to a numeric type works for the numeric types that can accommodate an unsigned short. For other numeric types, an explicit conversion is required.

String Type

C#’s string type (aliasing the System.String type) represents an immutable sequence of Unicode characters. A string literal is specified inside double quotes:

string a = "Heat";

Note

string is a reference type, rather than a value type. Its equality operators, however, follow value-type semantics:

string a = "test", b = "test";
Console.Write (a == b);  // True

The escape sequences that are valid for char literals also work inside strings:

string ...