Method Overloading

Polymorphism is one of the main characteristics of Object Oriented Programming (OOP). Put simply, it allows an object to behave in various ways depending on the manner in which it is used. For example, you could have a method execute differently based on the type and/or number of parameters passed to it. Method Overloading is what makes this example possible.  To accomplish Method Overloading, a developer can define two or more methods with the same name. Each method will take a different set of parameters.  The parameter combination or signature, is what the compiler uses to determine which method to use.

Good examples of Method Overloading in the .NET Framework include (but are not limited to) the Console.WriteLine() and Substring() methods.  You can pass different types to the Console.WriteLine() method and it will work because there are variations of the methods that will accept the different types.

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C# Program

using System;
namespace MethodOverloading
{
  class Program
  {
     static void Main(string[] args)
     {
         MethodOverloadPlay(10, 3);
         Console.WriteLine("+++++");
         MethodOverloadPlay(5, 5, 6);
         Console.WriteLine("+++++");
         MethodOverloadPlay("SP");
         Console.ReadLine();
     }

     static void MethodOverloadPlay(int number1, int number2)
     {
         int result = number1 + number2;
         Console.WriteLine(result);
     }

     static void MethodOverloadPlay(int number1, int number2, int number3)
     {
         int result = number1 + number2 + number3;
         Console.WriteLine(result);
     }

     static void MethodOverloadPlay(string string1)
     {
         Console.WriteLine("Breaking Benjamin & Sick Puppies Rock!");
     }
  }
}

C# Listing on GitHub 

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Result

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The main advantage of Method Overloading is code readability. Programming languages that do not allow Method Overloading require the developer to create totally separate methods for each variation of the input.  Blackwasp Consulting states the following example: in the ANSI C programming language to truncate a value you would use trunc, truncf or truncl according to the data type being rounded.  In C#, method overloading allows you to always call Math.Truncate.

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Additional Information

• C# Method Overloading – BlackWasp Consulting
• Guidelines for Method Overloading – Dave Donaldson
• Method overloading – CSharp .Net-tutorials
• Method overloading in C# .Net – Coder Source

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