Common Type System (CTS) in .NET
The Common Type System (CTS) defines how the types has to be declared, used in different languages of .Net. The Common Language Runtime (CLR) of .Net supports all the types defined in Common Type System.
The Common Type System contains all types defined by every .Net language, that doesn't mean that every .Net language supports all types in CTS. For example integers are defined by using Integer keyword in Vb.Net whereas in C# integers are defined by using int keyword.
The Common Type System Supports two general categories. Those are Value Types and Reference Types in .Net
|
CTS Data Type |
VB.NET Keyword |
C# Keyword |
C++/CLI Keyword |
|
System.Byte |
Byte |
byte |
unsigned char |
|
System.SByte |
SByte |
sbyte |
signed char |
|
System.Int16 |
Short |
short |
short |
|
System.Int32 |
Integer |
int |
int or long |
|
System.Int64 |
Long |
long |
__int64 |
|
System.UInt16 |
UShort |
ushort |
unsigned short |
|
System.UInt32 |
UInteger |
uint |
unsigned int or unsigned long |
|
System.UInt64 |
ULong |
ulong |
unsigned __int64 |
|
System.Single |
Single |
float |
Float |
|
System.Double |
Double |
double |
Double |
|
System.Object |
Object |
object |
Object^ |
|
System.Char |
Char |
char |
wchar_t |
|
System.String |
String |
string |
String^ |
|
System.Decimal |
Decimal |
decimal |
Decimal |
|
System.Boolean |
Boolean |
bool |
Bool |
Value Types: Value types are store actual data not reference to data and value types are stored in Stack memory. Example of value types are integers, decimals, float, boolean...etc. Please find below table for how to represent value types in different languages.
Reference Types: Reference types store reference to the data instead of actual data and stored in heap memory. Examples of Reference types are Class, interface,
Structure, Enumerations. All these are represented as almost same in all .Net languages.
For more information on Value Types and Reference Types Click here.
