.NET Interview Questions - Part 6

1. When do you absolutely have to declare a class as abstract (as opposed to free-willed educated choice or decision based on UML diagram)?

When at least one of the methods in the class is abstract. When the class itself is inherited from an abstract class, but not all base abstract methods have been over-ridden.

2. What’s an interface class?

It’s an abstract class with public abstract methods all of which must be implemented in the inherited classes.


3. Why can’t you specify the accessibility modifier for methods inside the interface?

They all must be public. Therefore, to prevent you from getting the false impression that you have any freedom of choice, you are not allowed to specify any accessibility, it’s public by default.


4. Can you inherit multiple interfaces?

Yes, why not.

5. And if they have conflicting method names?

It’s up to you to implement the method inside your own class, so implementation is left entirely up to you.

This might cause a problem on a higher-level scale if similarly named methods from different interfaces expect different data, but as far as compiler cares you’re okay.

6. What’s the difference between an interface and abstract class?

In the interface all methods must be abstract; in the abstract class some methods can be concrete. In the interface no accessibility modifiers are allowed, which is ok in abstract classes.


7. How can you overload a method?

Different parameter data types, different number of parameters, different order of parameters.


8. If a base class has a bunch of overloaded constructors, and an inherited class has another bunch of overloaded constructors, can you enforce a call from an inherited constructor to an arbitrary base constructor?

Yes, just place a colon, and then keyword base (parameter list to invoke the appropriate constructor) in the overloaded constructor definition inside the inherited class.


9. What’s the difference between System.String and System.StringBuilder classes?

System.String is immutable; System.StringBuilder was designed with the purpose of having a mutable string where a variety of operations can be performed.


10. What’s the advantage of using System.Text.StringBuilder over System.String?

StringBuilder is more efficient in the cases, where a lot of manipulation is done to the text. Strings are immutable, so each time it’s being operated on, a new instance is created.


11. Can you store multiple data types in System.Array?

No.


12. What’s the difference between the System.Array.CopyTo() and System.Array.Clone()?

The first one performs a deep copy of the array, the second one is shallow.


13. How can you sort the elements of the array in descending order?

By calling Sort() and then Reverse() methods.


14. What’s the .NET datatype that allows the retrieval of data by a unique key?

HashTable.

15. What’s class SortedList underneath?

A sorted HashTable.