What’s New in C#7 and C# 8

This short course covers the latest and greatest features of C#, covering versions 7, 7.1, 7.2, 7.3 and 8.0 [BETA] of the language that are being sim–shipped with corresponding Visual Studio updates.

Course Topics

Here’s every language feature presented in this course, grouped by the version of the C# language.

C# 7:

Out Variables

Pattern Matching (is and switch expressions)

Tuples and Tuple Deconstruction

Local Functions

Ref Returns and Locals

Expression Bodied Members

Throw Expressions

Generalized Async Return Types

Literal Improvements

C# 7.1:

How to turn on C# 7.1 support

Async Main

Default Expressions

Ref Assemblies

Infer Tuple Names

Pattern–Matching with Generics

C# 7.2:

Leading Digit Separators

‘Private Protected’ Access Modifier

Non–Trailing Named Arguments

Reference Semantics on Value Types:

‘In’ Parameters

‘Ref Readonly’ Variables

‘Ref Struct’ and Span<T>

C# 7.3:

Performance improvements

Access fixed fields without pinning

Reassign ref local variables

Use initializers on stackalloc arrays 

Use fixed statements on any type that supports a pattern 

Enhancements to existing features 

Tuple and ! support 

Use expression variables in more locations 

Attach attributes to backing field of auto–properties 

Improved method resolution when arguments differ by ‘in’ 

Improved overload resolution 

New compiler options: 

deterministic

publicsign

pathmap

C# 8 [BETA]:

Nullable Reference Types