What are the use cases for this static reflection code?

Posted by Maslow on Stack Overflow See other posts from Stack Overflow or by Maslow
Published on 2010-04-07T21:19:44Z Indexed on 2010/04/07 21:23 UTC
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This is Oliver Hanappi's static reflection code he posted on stackoverflow

private static string GetMemberName(Expression expression)
    {
        switch (expression.NodeType)
        {
            case ExpressionType.MemberAccess:
                var memberExpression = (MemberExpression)expression;
                var supername = GetMemberName(memberExpression.Expression);

                if (String.IsNullOrEmpty(supername))
                    return memberExpression.Member.Name;

                return String.Concat(supername, '.', memberExpression.Member.Name);

            case ExpressionType.Call:
                var callExpression = (MethodCallExpression)expression;
                return callExpression.Method.Name;

            case ExpressionType.Convert:
                var unaryExpression = (UnaryExpression)expression;
                return GetMemberName(unaryExpression.Operand);

            case ExpressionType.Parameter:
                return String.Empty;

            default:
                throw new ArgumentException("The expression is not a member access or method call expression");
        }
    }

I have the public wrapper methods:

public static string Name<T>(Expression<Action<T>> expression)
    {
        return GetMemberName(expression.Body);
    }
public static string Name<T>(Expression<Func<T, object>> expression)
    {
        return GetMemberName(expression.Body);
    }

then added my own method shortcuts

        public static string ClassMemberName<T>(this T sourceType,Expression<Func<T,object>> expression)
    {
        return GetMemberName(expression.Body);
    }
    public static string TMemberName<T>(this IEnumerable<T> sourceList, Expression<Func<T,object>> expression)
    {
        return GetMemberName(expression.Body);
    }

What are examples of code that would necessitate or take advantage of the different branches in the GetMemberName(Expression expression) switch? what all is this code capable of making strongly typed?

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