There is no access to an immutable domain state.

Question

Why can't I get access to an immutable domain state in the following case?

namespace ConsoleApplication
{
    domain Domain
    {
        private readonly int number = 5;
        
        channel Channel
        {
        }
        
        private agent Agent : channel Channel
        {
            public Agent()
            {
                int i = number;
            }
        }
    }
}

Answer 1

Hi Andrei,

readonly cannot be accessed for several reasons. First, being a carry-over from C#, readonly doesn't mean deep immutability, so if we allowed it you would be able to mutate the data it refers to (as in, "my_readonly_member.n=10"). Second, readonly can "escape" domain constructor, so you could have a situation where a no-access agent can read a member that a constructor can write to, which is a data race.

Check out async, const and sync modifiers. Here is an intro: http://blogs.msdn.com/maestroteam/archive/2009/05/02/empty-full-storage.aspx

Thanks,

---

Artur Laksberg - MSFT

Answer 2

Hi Artur,

Thanks for the answer.


Andrei