Conversion between types in discriminated unions

Question

I have a function, which can returns different types, and I use discriminated union for this. What I need, is to have conversion from one type in discriminated union to another type. Also some of the types can be convertable to all other types (String), but some of the types can be converted only to String (MyCustomType)

For this I've added member method ConvertTo to the ResultType:

type MyTypes = 
   | Boolean       = 1
   | Integer       = 2
   | Decimal       = 3
   | Double        = 4
   | String        = 5
   | MyCustomType  = 6

type ResultType = 
   | Boolean of bool
   | Integer of int
   | Decimal of decimal
   | Double of double
   | String of string
   | MyCustomType of MyCustomType

   with 
     member this.ConvertTo(newType: MyTypes) = 
       match this with 
       | ResultType.Boolean(value) -> 
           match newType with 
           | MyTypes.Boolean -> 
              this
           | MyTypes.Integer -> 
              ResultType.Integer(if value then 1 else 0)
          ...
       | ResultType.MyCustomType(value) -> 
           match newType with 
           | MyTypes.MyCustomType -> 
              this
           | MyTypes.String -> 
              ResultType.String(value.ToString()) 
           | _ -> 
              failwithf "Conversion from MyCustomType to %s is not supported" (newType.ToString())

I don't like such construction, because if I add more types, this requires me to do many changes: MyTypes, ResultType and also in several places in the ConvertTo member function.

Can anybody suggest better solution for such types conversion?

Thanks in advance

If you add more types, the matrix of conversions is O(N^2), so of course there are a lot of changes, it is intrinsically a large problem. — Brian
@Brian. I'm not sure is this can be used here and how to implement in right way, but is it possible to use some intermediate type MyIntermediateClass for conversion, and Convert to other types like: Double -> MyIntermediateClass -> MyCustomClass - in this case it will be O(2*N). — Vitaliy

wmeyer wmeyer · Accepted Answer · 2011-03-15T18:57:02

With a slightly different design, it is possible to exploit System.Convert.ChangeType and the fact that the constructors of discriminated unions are actually functions:

// statically typed wrapper for System.Convert.ChangeType
let conv a : 'T = System.Convert.ChangeType(a, typeof<'T>) :?> 'T

type MyCustomType() = class end

type ResultType = 
  | Boolean of bool
  | Integer of int
  | Decimal of decimal
  | Double of double
  | String of string
  | MyCustomType of MyCustomType
  with
    member this.ConvertTo (newType:'T->ResultType) =
      match this with
      | Boolean b -> newType( conv b )
      | Integer i -> newType( conv i )
      | Decimal d -> newType( conv d )
      | Double d -> newType( conv d )
      | String s -> newType( conv s )
      | MyCustomType m ->
         if typeof<'T> <> typeof<string> then
            raise (new System.InvalidCastException("MyCustomType can only be converted to String"))
         else
            String (m.ToString())

let i = Integer 42

let b = i.ConvertTo Boolean
printfn "%A" b

let d = i.ConvertTo Decimal
printfn "%A" d

let d2 = i.ConvertTo Double
printfn "%A" d2

let s = i.ConvertTo String
printfn "%A" s

//let mi = i.ConvertTo MyCustomType  // throws InvalidCastException

let m = MyCustomType (new MyCustomType())
let sm = m.ConvertTo String
printfn "%A" sm

//let im = m.ConvertTo Integer // throws InvalidCastException

EDIT: Once you add more custom types, this will not help much.

Maybe you should make your custom types implement IConvertible. Then you can remove the special case code from ConvertTo and completely rely on System.Convert.ChangeType.

You would still have to extend every custom type's ToObject implementation whenever you add a new custom type. Whether that really is better than a central ConvertTofunction is debatable.

Conversion between types in discriminated unions

2 Answers