4 Type Design Guidelines

FROM THE CLR perspective, there are only two categories of types—reference types and value types—but for the purpose of a discussion about framework design, we divide types into more logical groups, each with its own specific design rules. Figure 4-1 shows these logical groups.

FIGURE 4-1: The logical grouping of types

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Classes are the general case of reference types. They make up the bulk of types in the majority of frameworks. Classes owe their popularity to the rich set of object-oriented features they support and to their general applicability. Base classes and abstract classes are special logical groups related to ...

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