Professional .NET 2.0 Generics

Chapter 2. Valuing Type Safety

This book is filled with references to the importance of type safety. The term gets thrown around very loosely inside and outside the world of generics. So much so, that it seems like its meaning is often lost in the shuffle as a core value for many developers. Now, with generics, it's worth reexamining the value of type safety because it's one of the motivating factors that influenced the introduction of this new language feature. This chapter revisits the origins of type safety and discusses some of the unsafe trends that have become a common occurrence. Certainly, this is an area where there may be some disagreement. However, it's an area that needs to be discussed as part of sharpening your awareness and understanding the impact generics will have on your everyday approach to designing and building solutions.