C#•3mo ago

Generically creating a delegate from a MethodInfo with parameter upcasting

I am trying to create a delegate of type TDelegate that allows me to invoke a MethodInfo instance with some upcasted parameters. A simple example of what i want is as follows:

using System.Reflection;

MethodInfo someFunctionMethodInfo = typeof(MyTestClass).GetMethod(nameof(MyTestClass.SomeFunction), BindingFlags.Static | BindingFlags.Public)!;

// Note, SomeFunction is an Action<object> and i want an Action<int>
// System.ArgumentException: 'Cannot bind to the target method because its signature is not compatible with that of the delegate type.'
var customDelegateUpcasting = DelegateHelper.CreateDelegateWithCasting<Action<int>>(someFunctionMethodInfo);
customDelegateUpcasting(10);

// Desired output:
// SomeFunction invoked with parameter: 10, Type: System.Int32

Console.ReadLine();

class DelegateHelper
{
    public static TDelegate CreateDelegateWithCasting<TDelegate>(MethodInfo method)
        where TDelegate : Delegate
    {
        // Currently throws:
        // System.ArgumentException: 'Cannot bind to the target method because its signature is not compatible with that of the delegate type.'
        return method.CreateDelegate<TDelegate>();
    }
}

class MyTestClass
{
    public static void SomeFunction(object param)
    {
        Console.WriteLine($"{nameof(SomeFunction)} invoked with parameter: {param}, Type: {param.GetType()}");
    }
}

using System.Reflection;

MethodInfo someFunctionMethodInfo = typeof(MyTestClass).GetMethod(nameof(MyTestClass.SomeFunction), BindingFlags.Static | BindingFlags.Public)!;

// Note, SomeFunction is an Action<object> and i want an Action<int>
// System.ArgumentException: 'Cannot bind to the target method because its signature is not compatible with that of the delegate type.'
var customDelegateUpcasting = DelegateHelper.CreateDelegateWithCasting<Action<int>>(someFunctionMethodInfo);
customDelegateUpcasting(10);

// Desired output:
// SomeFunction invoked with parameter: 10, Type: System.Int32

Console.ReadLine();

class DelegateHelper
{
    public static TDelegate CreateDelegateWithCasting<TDelegate>(MethodInfo method)
        where TDelegate : Delegate
    {
        // Currently throws:
        // System.ArgumentException: 'Cannot bind to the target method because its signature is not compatible with that of the delegate type.'
        return method.CreateDelegate<TDelegate>();
    }
}

class MyTestClass
{
    public static void SomeFunction(object param)
    {
        Console.WriteLine($"{nameof(SomeFunction)} invoked with parameter: {param}, Type: {param.GetType()}");
    }
}

The tldr, i want to take method void SomeFunction(object param) and create a delegate Action<int>... generically In this example im just calling MethodInfo::CreateDelegate<TDelegate>() - which fails. This is fine, i expect and understand why this happens. I'm just looking for ideas to achieve what im looking for. traditionally, i might just wrap the MethodInfo invocation within a lambda and call it a day... but since TDelegate is a generic type i dont actually know the number of parameters until the CreateDelegateWithCasting helper method is called - which is where my problem lies.

1 Reply

RettophOP•3mo ago

I have been pursuing a possible solution by creating a DynamicMethod - the proof of concept i have at the moment looks like so:

class DelegateHelper
{
    public static TDelegate CreateDelegateWithCasting<TDelegate>(MethodInfo method)
        where TDelegate : Delegate
    {
        MethodInfo outDelegateSignature = typeof(TDelegate).GetMethod("Invoke") ?? throw new NotImplementedException();

        DynamicMethod dynamicMethod = new DynamicMethod(
            "Test",
            typeof(void),
            outDelegateSignature.GetParameters().Select(x => x.ParameterType).ToArray(),
            typeof(Program).Module);

        ILGenerator ilGenerator = dynamicMethod.GetILGenerator();

        // Load arguments
        ilGenerator.Emit(OpCodes.Ldarg_0);
        ilGenerator.Emit(OpCodes.Box, outDelegateSignature.GetParameters().First().ParameterType);

        ilGenerator.Emit(OpCodes.Call, method);
        ilGenerator.Emit(OpCodes.Ret);

        return dynamicMethod.CreateDelegate<TDelegate>();
    }
}

class DelegateHelper
{
    public static TDelegate CreateDelegateWithCasting<TDelegate>(MethodInfo method)
        where TDelegate : Delegate
    {
        MethodInfo outDelegateSignature = typeof(TDelegate).GetMethod("Invoke") ?? throw new NotImplementedException();

        DynamicMethod dynamicMethod = new DynamicMethod(
            "Test",
            typeof(void),
            outDelegateSignature.GetParameters().Select(x => x.ParameterType).ToArray(),
            typeof(Program).Module);

        ILGenerator ilGenerator = dynamicMethod.GetILGenerator();

        // Load arguments
        ilGenerator.Emit(OpCodes.Ldarg_0);
        ilGenerator.Emit(OpCodes.Box, outDelegateSignature.GetParameters().First().ParameterType);

        ilGenerator.Emit(OpCodes.Call, method);
        ilGenerator.Emit(OpCodes.Ret);

        return dynamicMethod.CreateDelegate<TDelegate>();
    }
}

But... im already starting to see how much work its going to take to achieve my goal. Is this already a solved problem? I feel like i cant be the first to want this - is there a better solution than the IL & reflection madness ive embarked on? Perhaps a usefil library that already did the hard work for me? Any ideas would be hugely appreciated. thanks!

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Generically creating a delegate from a MethodInfo with parameter upcasting