C# 12 has been released November 2023. I’ve written separate articles about each of the new features:

There were a few small things left that didn’t make it into separate articles.

Experimental attribute

In C# 12 was added a new Experimental attribute. We can use this attribute to indicate classes, methods, properties that are in experimental stage. It allows us to indicate that a given piece of code is in the experimental stage and may change or disappear completely.

[Experimental(diagnosticId: "KROS_EXPERIMENTAL_001")]
public class ExperimentalClass
{
    [Experimental(diagnosticId: "KROS_EXPERIMENTAL_002")]
    public void ExperimentalMethod()
    {
    }

    [Experimental(diagnosticId: "KROS_EXPERIMENTAL_003")]
    public int ExperimentalProperty { get; set; }
}

Diagnostic message:

'{0}' is for evaluation purposes only and is subject to change or removal in future updates.

ref readonly parameters

In C# 12, the option to use ref readonly parameters has been added. This way we can ensure that the method will not change the value of the parameter.

static void Print(ref readonly int value)
{
    // value = 10; // 👈 compilation error
    Console.WriteLine(value);
}

Reasons directly from the documentation:

  • APIs created before in was introduced might use ref even though the argument isn’t modified. Those APIs can be updated with ref readonly. It won’t be a breaking change for callers, as would be if the ref parameter was changed to in.
  • APIs that take an in parameter, but logically require a variable. A value expression doesn’t work.
  • APIs that use ref because they require a variable, but don’t mutate that variable.

Default Lambda Parameters

Until now it was not possible to use default values for parameters in lambdas. Since C# 12 this is now possible.

var getProductPrice = (decimal price, string currency = "€", string format = "f4")
    => string.Format("Price is {0} {1}", price.ToString(format), currency);

string price1 = getProductPrice(1000M);
string price2 = getProductPrice(1000M, "CZK");
string price3 = getProductPrice(1000M, "CZK", "f2");