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Required Members

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Note

This article is a feature specification. The specification serves as the design document for the feature. It includes proposed specification changes, along with information needed during the design and development of the feature. These articles are published until the proposed spec changes are finalized and incorporated in the current ECMA specification.

There may be some discrepancies between the feature specification and the completed implementation. Those differences are captured in the pertinent language design meeting (LDM) notes.

You can learn more about the process for adopting feature speclets into the C# language standard in the article on the specifications.

Summary

This proposal adds a way of specifying that a property or field is required to be set during object initialization, forcing the instance creator to provide an initial value for the member in an object initializer at the creation site.

Motivation

Object hierarchies today require a lot of boilerplate to carry data across all levels of the hierarchy. Let's look at a simple hierarchy involving a Person as might be defined in C# 8:

class Person
{
    public string FirstName { get; }
    public string MiddleName { get; }
    public string LastName { get; }

    public Person(string firstName, string lastName, string? middleName = null)
    {
        FirstName = firstName;
        LastName = lastName;
        MiddleName = middleName ?? string.Empty;
    }
}

class Student : Person
{
    public int ID { get; }
    public Student(int id, string firstName, string lastName, string? middleName = null)
        : base(firstName, lastName, middleName)
    {
        ID = id;
    }
}

There's lots of repetition going on here:

  1. At the root of the hierarchy, the type of each property had to be repeated twice, and the name had to be repeated four times.
  2. At the derived level, the type of each inherited property had to be repeated once, and the name had to be repeated twice.

This is a simple hierarchy with 3 properties and 1 level of inheritance, but many real-world examples of these types of hierarchies go many levels deeper, accumulating larger and larger numbers of properties to pass along as they do so. Roslyn is one such codebase, for example, in the various tree types that make our CSTs and ASTs. This nesting is tedious enough that we have code generators to generate the constructors and definitions of these types, and many customers take similar approaches to the problem. C# 9 introduces records, which for some scenarios can make this better:

record Person(string FirstName, string LastName, string MiddleName = "");
record Student(int ID, string FirstName, string LastName, string MiddleName = "") : Person(FirstName, LastName, MiddleName);

records eliminate the first source of duplication, but the second source of duplication remains unchanged: unfortunately, this is the source of duplication that grows as the hierarchy grows, and is the most painful part of the duplication to fix up after making a change in the hierarchy as it required chasing the hierarchy through all of its locations, possibly even across projects and potentially breaking consumers.

As a workaround to avoid this duplication, we have long seen consumers embracing object initializers as a way of avoiding writing constructors. Prior to C# 9, however, this had 2 major downsides:

  1. The object hierarchy has to be fully mutable, with set accessors on every property.
  2. There is no way to ensure that every instantiation of an object from the graph sets every member.

C# 9 again addressed the first issue here, by introducing the init accessor: with it, these properties can be set on object creation/initialization, but not subsequently. However, we again still have the second issue: properties in C# have been optional since C# 1.0. Nullable reference types, introduced in C# 8.0, addressed part of this issue: if a constructor does not initialize a non-nullable reference-type property, then the user is warned about it. However, this doesn't solve the problem: the user here wants to not repeat large parts of their type in the constructor, they want to pass the requirement to set properties on to their consumers. It also doesn't provide any warnings about ID from Student, as that is a value type. These scenarios are extremely common in database model ORMs, such as EF Core, which need to have a public parameterless constructor but then drive nullability of the rows based on the nullability of the properties.

This proposal seeks to address these concerns by introducing a new feature to C#: required members. Required members will be required to be initialized by consumers, rather than by the type author, with various customizations to allow flexibility for multiple constructors and other scenarios.

Detailed Design

class, struct, and record types gain the ability to declare a required_member_list. This list is the list of all the properties and fields of a type that are considered required, and must be initialized during the construction and initialization of an instance of the type. Types inherit these lists from their base types automatically, providing a seamless experience that removes boilerplate and repetitive code.

required modifier

We add 'required' to the list of modifiers in field_modifier and property_modifier. The required_member_list of a type is composed of all the members that have had required applied to them. Thus, the Person type from earlier now looks like this:

public class Person
{
    // The default constructor requires that FirstName and LastName be set at construction time
    public required string FirstName { get; init; }
    public string MiddleName { get; init; } = "";
    public required string LastName { get; init; }
}

All constructors on a type that has a required_member_list automatically advertise a contract that consumers of the type must initialize all of the properties in the list. It is an error for a constructor to advertise a contract that requires a member that is not at least as accessible as the constructor itself. For example:

public class C
{
    public required int Prop { get; protected init; }

    // Advertises that Prop is required. This is fine, because the constructor is just as accessible as the property initer.
    protected C() {}

    // Error: ctor C(object) is more accessible than required property Prop.init.
    public C(object otherArg) {}
}

required is only valid in class, struct, and record types. It is not valid in interface types. required cannot be combined with the following modifiers:

  • fixed
  • ref readonly
  • ref
  • const
  • static

required is not allowed to be applied to indexers.

The compiler will issue a warning when Obsolete is applied to a required member of a type and:

  1. The type is not marked Obsolete, or
  2. Any constructor not attributed with SetsRequiredMembersAttribute is not marked Obsolete.

SetsRequiredMembersAttribute

All constructors in a type with required members, or whose base type specifies required members, must have those members set by a consumer when that constructor is called. In order to exempt constructors from this requirement, a constructor can be attributed with SetsRequiredMembersAttribute, which removes these requirements. The constructor body is not validated to ensure that it definitely sets the required members of the type.

SetsRequiredMembersAttribute removes all requirements from a constructor, and those requirements are not checked for validity in any way. NB: this is the escape hatch if inheriting from a type with an invalid required members list is necessary: mark the constructor of that type with SetsRequiredMembersAttribute, and no errors will be reported.

If a constructor C chains to a base or this constructor that is attributed with SetsRequiredMembersAttribute, C must also be attributed with SetsRequiredMembersAttribute.

For record types, we will emit SetsRequiredMembersAttribute on the synthesized copy constructor of a record if the record type or any of its base types have required members.

NB: An earlier version of this proposal had a larger metalanguage around initialization, allowing adding and removing individual required members from a constructor, as well as validation that the constructor was setting all required members. This was deemed too complex for the initial release, and removed. We can look at adding more complex contracts and modifications as a later feature.

Enforcement

For every constructor Ci in type T with required members R, consumers calling Ci must do one of:

  • Set all members of R in an object_initializer on the object_creation_expression,
  • Or set all members of R via the named_argument_list section of an attribute_target.

unless Ci is attributed with SetsRequiredMembers.

If the current context does not permit an object_initializer or is not an attribute_target, and Ci is not attributed with SetsRequiredMembers, then it is an error to call Ci.

new() constraint

A type with a parameterless constructor that advertises a contract is not allowed to be substituted for a type parameter constrained to new(), as there is no way for the generic instantiation to ensure that the requirements are satisfied.

struct defaults

Required members are not enforced on instances of struct types created with default or default(StructType). They are enforced for struct instances created with new StructType(), even when StructType has no parameterless constructor and the default struct constructor is used.

Accessibility

It is an error to mark a member required if the member cannot be set in any context where the containing type is visible.

  • If the member is a field, it cannot be readonly.
  • If the member is a property, it must have a setter or initer at least as accessible as the member's containing type.

This means the following cases are not allowed:

interface I
{
    int Prop1 { get; }
}
public class Base
{
    public virtual int Prop2 { get; set; }

    protected required int _field; // Error: _field is not at least as visible as Base. Open question below about the protected constructor scenario

    public required readonly int _field2; // Error: required fields cannot be readonly
    protected Base() { }

    protected class Inner
    {
        protected required int PropInner { get; set; } // Error: PropInner cannot be set inside Base or Derived
    }
}
public class Derived : Base, I
{
    required int I.Prop1 { get; } // Error: explicit interface implementions cannot be required as they cannot be set in an object initializer

    public required override int Prop2 { get; set; } // Error: this property is hidden by Derived.Prop2 and cannot be set in an object initializer
    public new int Prop2 { get; }

    public required int Prop3 { get; } // Error: Required member must have a setter or initer

    public required int Prop4 { get; internal set; } // Error: Required member setter must be at least as visible as the constructor of Derived
}

It is an error to hide a required member, as that member can no longer be set by a consumer.

When overriding a required member, the required keyword must be included on the method signature. This is done so that if we ever want to allow unrequiring a property with an override in the future, we have design space to do so.

Overrides are allowed to mark a member required where it was not required in the base type. A member so-marked is added to the required members list of the derived type.

Types are allowed to override required virtual properties. This means that if the base virtual property has storage, and the derived type tries to access the base implementation of that property, they could observe uninitialized storage. NB: This is a general C# anti-pattern, and we don't think that this proposal should attempt to address it.

Effect on nullable analysis

Members that are marked required are not required to be initialized to a valid nullable state at the end of a constructor. All required members from this type and any base types are considered by nullable analysis to be default at the beginning of any constructor in that type, unless chaining to a this or base constructor that is attributed with SetsRequiredMembersAttribute.

Nullable analysis will warn about all required members from the current and base types that do not have a valid nullable state at the end of a constructor attributed with SetsRequiredMembersAttribute.

#nullable enable
public class Base
{
    public required string Prop1 { get; set; }

    public Base() {}

    [SetsRequiredMembers]
    public Base(int unused) { Prop1 = ""; }
}
public class Derived : Base
{
    public required string Prop2 { get; set; }

    [SetsRequiredMembers]
    public Derived() : base()
    {
    } // Warning: Prop1 and Prop2 are possibly null.

    [SetsRequiredMembers]
    public Derived(int unused) : base()
    {
        Prop1.ToString(); // Warning: possibly null dereference
        Prop2.ToString(); // Warning: possibly null dereference
    }

    [SetsRequiredMembers]
    public Derived(int unused, int unused2) : this()
    {
        Prop1.ToString(); // Ok
        Prop2.ToString(); // Ok
    }

    [SetsRequiredMembers]
    public Derived(int unused1, int unused2, int unused3) : base(unused1)
    {
        Prop1.ToString(); // Ok
        Prop2.ToString(); // Warning: possibly null dereference
    }
}

Metadata Representation

The following 2 attributes are known to the C# compiler and required for this feature to function:

namespace System.Runtime.CompilerServices
{
    [AttributeUsage(AttributeTargets.Class | AttributeTargets.Struct | AttributeTargets.Field | AttributeTargets.Property, AllowMultiple = false, Inherited = false)]
    public sealed class RequiredMemberAttribute : Attribute
    {
        public RequiredMemberAttribute() {}
    }
}

namespace System.Diagnostics.CodeAnalysis
{
    [AttributeUsage(AttributeTargets.Constructor, AllowMultiple = false, Inherited = false)]
    public sealed class SetsRequiredMembersAttribute : Attribute
    {
        public SetsRequiredMembersAttribute() {}
    }
}

It is an error to manually apply RequiredMemberAttribute to a type.

Any member that is marked required has a RequiredMemberAttribute applied to it. In addition, any type that defines such members is marked with RequiredMemberAttribute, as a marker to indicate that there are required members in this type. Note that if type B derives from A, and A defines required members but B does not add any new or override any existing required members, B will not be marked with a RequiredMemberAttribute. To fully determine whether there are any required members in B, checking the full inheritance hierarchy is necessary.

Any constructor in a type with required members that does not have SetsRequiredMembersAttribute applied to it is marked with two attributes:

  1. System.Runtime.CompilerServices.CompilerFeatureRequiredAttribute with the feature name "RequiredMembers".
  2. System.ObsoleteAttribute with the string "Types with required members are not supported in this version of your compiler", and the attribute is marked as an error, to prevent any older compilers from using these constructors.

We don't use a modreq here because it is a goal to maintain binary compat: if the last required property was removed from a type, the compiler would no longer synthesize this modreq, which is a binary-breaking change and all consumers would need to be recompiled. A compiler that understands required members will ignore this obsolete attribute. Note that members can come from base types as well: even if there are no new required members in the current type, if any base type has required members, this Obsolete attribute will be generated. If the constructor already has an Obsolete attribute, no additional Obsolete attribute will be generated.

We use both ObsoleteAttribute and CompilerFeatureRequiredAttribute because the latter is new this release, and older compilers don't understand it. In the future, we may be able to drop the ObsoleteAttribute and/or not use it to protect new features, but for now we need both for full protection.

To build the full list of required members R for a given type T, including all base types, the following algorithm is run:

  1. For every Tb, starting with T and working through the base type chain until object is reached.
  2. If Tb is marked with RequiredMemberAttribute, then all members of Tb marked with RequiredMemberAttribute are gathered into Rb
    1. For every Ri in Rb, if Ri is overridden by any member of R, it is skipped.
    2. Otherwise, if any Ri is hidden by a member of R, then the lookup of required members fails and no further steps are taken. Calling any constructor of T not attributed with SetsRequiredMembers issues an error.
    3. Otherwise, Ri is added to R.

Open Questions

Nested member initializers

What will the enforcement mechanisms for nested member initializers be? Will they be disallowed entirely?

class Range
{
    public required Location Start { get; init; }
    public required Location End { get; init; }
}

class Location
{
    public required int Column { get; init; }
    public required int Line { get; init; }
}

_ = new Range { Start = { Column = 0, Line = 0 }, End = { Column = 1, Line = 0 } } // Would this be allowed if Location is a struct type?
_ = new Range { Start = new Location { Column = 0, Line = 0 }, End = new Location { Column = 1, Line = 0 } } // Or would this form be necessary instead?

Discussed Questions

Level of enforcement for init clauses

The init clause feature wasn't implemented in C# 11. It remains an active proposal.

Do we strictly enforce that members specified in an init clause without an initializer must initialize all members? It seems likely that we do, otherwise we create an easy pit-of-failure. However, we also run the risk of reintroducing the same problems we solved with MemberNotNull in C# 9. If we want to strictly enforce this, we will likely need a way for a helper method to indicate that it sets a member. Some possible syntaxes we've discussed for this:

  • Allow init methods. These methods are only allowed to be called from a constructor or from another init method, and can access this as if it's in the constructor (ie, set readonly and init fields/properties). This can be combined with init clauses on such methods. A init clause would be considered satisfied if the member in the clause is definitely assigned in the body of the method/constructor. Calling a method with a init clause that includes a member counts as assigning to that member. If we do decided that this is a route we want to pursue, now or in the future, it seems likely that we should not use init as the keyword for the init clause on a constructor, as that would be confusing.
  • Allow the ! operator to suppress the warning/error explicitly. If initializing a member in a complicated way (such as in a shared method), the user can add a ! to the init clause to indicate the compiler should not check for initialization.

Conclusion: After discussion we like the idea of the ! operator. It allows the user to be intentional about more complicated scenarios while also not creating a large design hole around init methods and annotating every method as setting members X or Y. ! was chosen because we already use it for suppressing nullable warnings, and using it to tell the compiler "I'm smarter than you" in another place is a natural extension of the syntax form.

Required interface members

This proposal does not allow interfaces to mark members as required. This protects us from having to figure out complex scenarios around new() and interface constraints in generics right now, and is directly related to both factories and generic construction. In order to ensure that we have design space in this area, we forbid required in interfaces, and forbid types with required_member_lists from being substituted for type parameters constrained to new(). When we want to take a broader look at generic construction scenarios with factories, we can revisit this issue.

Syntax questions

The init clause feature wasn't implemented in C# 11. It remains an active proposal.

  • Is init the right word? init as a postfix modifier on the constructor might interfere if we ever want to reuse it for factories and also enable init methods with a prefix modifier. Other possibilities:
    • set
  • Is required the right modifier for specifying that all members are initialized? Others suggested:
    • default
    • all
    • With a ! to indicate complex logic
  • Should we require a separator between the base/this and the init?
    • : separator
    • ',' separator
  • Is required the right modifier? Other alternatives that have been suggested:
    • req
    • require
    • mustinit
    • must
    • explicit

Conclusion: We have removed the init constructor clause for now, and are proceeding with required as the property modifier.

Init clause restrictions

The init clause feature wasn't implemented in C# 11. It remains an active proposal.

Should we allow access to this in the init clause? If we want the assignment in init to be a shorthand for assigning the member in the constructor itself, it seems like we should.

Additionally, does it create a new scope, like base() does, or does it share the same scope as the method body? This is particularly important for things like local functions, which the init clause may want to access, or for name shadowing, if an init expression introduces a variable via out parameter.

Conclusion: init clause has been removed.

Accessibility requirements and init

The init clause feature wasn't implemented in C# 11. It remains an active proposal.

In versions of this proposal with the init clause, we talked about being able to have the following scenario:

public class Base
{
    protected required int _field;

    protected Base() {} // Contract required that _field is set
}
public class Derived : Base
{
    public Derived() : init(_field = 1) // Contract is fulfilled and _field is removed from the required members list
    {
    }
}

However, we have removed the init clause from the proposal at this point, so we need to decide whether to allow this scenario in a limited fashion. The options we have are:

  1. Disallow the scenario. This is the most conservative approach, and the rules in the Accessibility are currently written with this assumption in mind. The rule is that any member that is required must be at least as visible as its containing type.
  2. Require that all constructors are either:
    1. No more visible than the least-visible required member.
    2. Have the SetsRequiredMembersAttribute applied to the constructor. These would ensure that anyone who can see a constructor can either set all the things it exports, or there is nothing to set. This could be useful for types that are only ever created via static Create methods or similar builders, but the utility seems overall limited.
  3. Readd a way to remove specific parts of the contract to the proposal, as discussed in LDM previously.

Conclusion: Option 1, all required members must be at least as visible as their containing type.

Override rules

The current spec says that the required keyword needs to be copied over and that overrides can make a member more required, but not less. Is that what we want to do? Allowing removal of requirements needs more contract modification abilities than we are currently proposing.

Conclusion: Adding required on override is allowed. If the overridden member is required, the overridding member must also be required.

Alternative metadata representation

We could also take a different approach to metadata representation, taking a page from extension methods. We could put a RequiredMemberAttribute on the type to indicate that the type contains required members, and then put a RequiredMemberAttribute on each member that is required. This would simplify the lookup sequence (no need to do member lookup, just look for members with the attribute).

Conclusion: Alternative approved.

Metadata Representation

The Metadata Representation needs to be approved. We additionally need to decide whether these attributes should be included in the BCL.

  1. For RequiredMemberAttribute, this attribute is more akin to the general embedded attributes we use for nullable/nint/tuple member names, and will not be manually applied by the user in C#. It's possible that other languages might want to manually apply this attribute, however.
  2. SetsRequiredMembersAttribute, on the other hand, is directly used by consumers, and thus should likely be in the BCL.

If we go with the alternative representation in the previous section, that might change the calculus on RequiredMemberAttribute: instead of being similar to the general embedded attributes for nint/nullable/tuple member names, it's closer to System.Runtime.CompilerServices.ExtensionAttribute, which has been in the framework since extension methods shipped.

Conclusion: We will put both attributes in the BCL.

Warning vs Error

Should not setting a required member be a warning or an error? It is certainly possible to trick the system, via Activator.CreateInstance(typeof(C)) or similar, which means we may not be able to fully guarantee all properties are always set. We also allow suppression of the diagnostics at the constructor-site by using the !, which we generally do not allow for errors. However, the feature is similar to readonly fields or init properties, in that we hard error if users attempt to set such a member after initialization, but they can be circumvented by reflection.

Conclusion: Errors.