Distinct not working with LINQ to Objects

Tanmoy_Rajguru_1312208 0
Viewed 121603
class Program
{
    static void Main(string[] args)
    {
        List<Book> books = new List<Book> 
        {
            new Book
            {
                Name="C# in Depth",
                Authors = new List<Author>
                {
                    new Author 
                    {
                        FirstName = "Jon", LastName="Skeet"
                    },
                     new Author 
                    {
                        FirstName = "Jon", LastName="Skeet"
                    },                       
                }
            },
            new Book
            {
                Name="LINQ in Action",
                Authors = new List<Author>
                {
                    new Author 
                    {
                        FirstName = "Fabrice", LastName="Marguerie"
                    },
                     new Author 
                    {
                        FirstName = "Steve", LastName="Eichert"
                    },
                     new Author 
                    {
                        FirstName = "Jim", LastName="Wooley"
                    },
                }
            },
        };


        var temp = books.SelectMany(book => book.Authors).Distinct();
        foreach (var author in temp)
        {
            Console.WriteLine(author.FirstName + " " + author.LastName);
        }

        Console.Read();
    }

}
public class Book
{
    public string Name { get; set; }
    public List<Author> Authors { get; set; }
}
public class Author
{
    public string FirstName { get; set; }
    public string LastName { get; set; }
    public override bool Equals(object obj)
    {
        return true;
        //if (obj.GetType() != typeof(Author)) return false;
        //else return ((Author)obj).FirstName == this.FirstName && ((Author)obj).FirstName == this.LastName;
    }

}

This is based on an example in "LINQ in Action". Listing 4.16.

This prints Jon Skeet twice. Why? I have even tried overriding Equals method in Author class. Still Distinct does not seem to work. What am I missing?

Edit: I have added == and != operator overload too. Still no help.

 public static bool operator ==(Author a, Author b)
    {
        return true;
    }
    public static bool operator !=(Author a, Author b)
    {
        return false;
    }
iequalitycomparer iequatable linq .net c#
10 Answers

You can achieve this several ways:

1. You may to implement the IEquatable interface as shown Enumerable.Distinct Method or you can see @skalb's answer at this post

2. If your object has not unique key, You can use GroupBy method for achive distinct object list, that you must group object's all properties and after select first object.

For example like as below and working for me:

var distinctList= list.GroupBy(x => new {
                            Name= x.Name,
                            Phone= x.Phone,
                            Email= x.Email,
                            Country= x.Country
                        }, y=> y)
                       .Select(x => x.First())
                       .ToList()

MyObject class is like as below:

public class MyClass{
       public string Name{get;set;}
       public string Phone{get;set;}
       public string Email{get;set;}
       public string Country{get;set;}
}

3. If your object's has unique key, you can only use the it in group by.

For example my object's unique key is Id.

var distinctList= list.GroupBy(x =>x.Id)
                      .Select(x => x.First())
                      .ToList()
user_88103110

You can use extension method on list which checks uniqueness based on computed Hash. You can also change extension method to support IEnumerable.

Example:

public class Employee{
public string Name{get;set;}
public int Age{get;set;}
}

List<Employee> employees = new List<Employee>();
employees.Add(new Employee{Name="XYZ", Age=30});
employees.Add(new Employee{Name="XYZ", Age=30});

employees = employees.Unique(); //Gives list which contains unique objects.

Extension Method:

    public static class LinqExtension
        {
            public static List<T> Unique<T>(this List<T> input)
            {
                HashSet<string> uniqueHashes = new HashSet<string>();
                List<T> uniqueItems = new List<T>();

                input.ForEach(x =>
                {
                    string hashCode = ComputeHash(x);

                    if (uniqueHashes.Contains(hashCode))
                    {
                        return;
                    }

                    uniqueHashes.Add(hashCode);
                    uniqueItems.Add(x);
                });

                return uniqueItems;
            }

            private static string ComputeHash<T>(T entity)
            {
                System.Security.Cryptography.SHA1CryptoServiceProvider sh = new System.Security.Cryptography.SHA1CryptoServiceProvider();
                string input = JsonConvert.SerializeObject(entity);

                byte[] originalBytes = ASCIIEncoding.Default.GetBytes(input);
                byte[] encodedBytes = sh.ComputeHash(originalBytes);

                return BitConverter.ToString(encodedBytes).Replace("-", "");
            }
user_43280350

The Equal operator in below code is incorrect.

Old

public bool Equals(Author other)
{
    if (FirstName == other.FirstName && LastName == other.LastName)
        return true;

    return false;
}

NEW

public override bool Equals(Object obj)
{
    var other = obj as Author;

    if (other is null)
    {
        return false;
    }

    if (FirstName == other.FirstName && LastName == other.LastName)
        return true;

    return false;
}
user_117030520
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