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C# | Action Delegate

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Action delegate is an in-built generic type delegate. This delegate saves you from defining a custom delegate as shown in the below examples and make your program more readable and optimized. It is defined under System namespace. It can contain minimum 1 and maximum of 16 input parameters and does not contain any output parameter. The Action delegate is generally used for those methods which do not contain any return value, or in other words, Action delegate is used with those methods whose return type is void. It can also contain parameters of the same type or of different types.

Syntax:

// One input parameter
public delegate void Action < in P > (P obj);

// Two input parameters
public delegate void Action < in P1, in P2 >(P1 arg1, P2 arg2);

Here, P, P1, and P2 are the type of the input parameters & arg1 and agr2 are the parameters of the method that Action delegate encapsulates.

Example: Below program illustrate how we create a custom delegate.




// C# program to illustrate delegates
using System;
  
class GFG {
  
    // Declaring the delegate
    public delegate void my_delegate(int p, int q);
  
    // Method
    public static void myfun(int p, int q)
    {
        Console.WriteLine(p - q);
    }
  
    // Main method
    static public void Main()
    {
  
        // Creating object of my_delegate
        my_delegate obj = myfun;
        obj(10, 5);
    }
}


Output:

5

Example: It demonstrates the use of Action delegate.




// C# program to illustrate Action delegates
using System;
  
class GFG {
  
    // Method
    public static void myfun(int p, int q)
    {
        Console.WriteLine(p - q);
    }
  
    // Main method
    static public void Main()
    {
  
        // Using Action delegate
        // Here, Action delegate 
        // contains two input parameters
        Action<int, int> val = myfun;
        val(20, 5);
    }
}


Output:

15

Explanation: In the above example, using Action delegate reduce the size of the code and make the program more readable. Here action delegate contains two input parameters. And we directly assign the myfun method to the Action delegate.

Important Points:

  • The only difference between Action Delegates and Function Delegates is that Action Delegates does not return anything i.e. having void return type.
  • An Action Delegate can also be initialized using the new keyword.
    Action<int> val = new Action<int>(myfun);
  • An Action Delegate can also be initialized by directly assigning to a method.
    Action<int> val = myfun;
  • You can also use an Action delegate with an anonymous method as shown in the below example:

    Example:




    Action<string> val = delegate(string str)
    {
        Console.WriteLine(str);
    };
    val("GeeksforGeeks");

    
    

  • You can also use a Action delegate with the lambda expressions as shown in the below example:

    Example:




    Action<string> val = str = > Console.WriteLine(str);
    val("GeeksforGeeks");

    
    



Last Updated : 07 Aug, 2019
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