c# - What is Interface Duck Typing?

Question

I heard the word Interface Duck Typing, but do not understand at all what is it? So I read a wiki about this and they said:

In computer programming with object-oriented programming languages, duck typing is a style of typing in which an object's methods and properties determine the valid semantics, rather than its inheritance from a particular class or implementation of an explicit interface. The name of the concept refers to the duck test.

But still could not understand what it. So I saw their program but they use dynamic keyword to call quack() & feather() function of all the classes.

I would request you all please explain in easy way what is Interface Duck Typing and how to implement in C# v2.0 because there is no dynamic keyword.

using System;

namespace DuckTyping 
{  
  public class Duck 
  {
    public void Quack() 
    {
      Console.WriteLine("Quaaaaaack!");
    }

    public void Feathers() 
    {
      Console.WriteLine("The duck has white and gray feathers.");
    }
  }

  public class Person 
  {
    public void Quack()
    {
      Console.WriteLine("The person imitates a duck.");
    }

    public void Feathers() 
    {
      Console.WriteLine("The person takes a feather from the ground and shows it.");
    }
  }

  internal class Program 
  {
    private static void InTheForest(dynamic duck) 
    {
      duck.Quack();
      duck.Feathers();
    }

    private static void Game() 
    {
      Duck donald = new Duck();
      Person john = new Person();
      InTheForest(donald);
      InTheForest(john);
    }

    private static void Main() 
    {
      Game();
    }
  }
}

Answer 1

C# has a nominal type system, so the compatibility of types is done based on their names. In your example you have two classes with a Quack method, however there is no way to write a method which can take instances of these two classes and invoke their Quack method.

In C# 2, the solution would be to introduce an interface and have both classes implement it:

public interface IQuack
{
    void Quack();
}

public class Duck : IQuack { }
public class Human : IQuack { }

now you can create a method which take an IQuack instance and can call Human.Quack and Duck.Quack through it. In C#, methods are resolved 'early' at compile time, so you need to create a named type which supports the operations the method need so the compilation can succeed. Note there is still a runtime element to calling these methods, since the real implementation of IQuack.Quack needs to be resolved at runtime depending on the real type of the argument.

In a duck-typing system, no attempt is made to validate that a method exists before runtime. All that is required is that a given object supports the operation in that it has the right name and takes the required number of parameters (none in this case), hence the 'if it quacks like a duck' expression.

Duck typing in C# 2 can only be done using reflection, in this case you would accept an object argument and look for the required methods yourself:

public static void MakeQuack(object duck)
{
    MethodInfo quackMethod = duck.GetType().GetMethod("Quack", Type.EmptyTypes, null);
    if (quackMethod!=null)
    {
        quackMethod.Invoke(duck, new object[] { });
    }
    else
    {
        throw new ArgumentException("No Quack() method found on target");
    }
}

C#4 makes this much simpler with dynamic:

public static void MakeQuack(dynamic duck)
{
    duck.Quack();
}