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C# for Programmers: A Practical Guide

Unary Operators

Explore how unary operators manipulate variable values in C# including pre-increment, post-decrement, sign negation, and logical negation. Understand their differences and practical usage in coding expressions.

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In the previous lesson we discussed the basic operators used in C#. One of the types listed was the unary operators. Let’s learn about them now.

Unary Operators Example

Take a look at the example below which uses the unary operators.

C#
using System;
class UnaryOps
{
    public static void Main()
    {
        int unOps = 5;
        int preIncrement;
        int preDecrement;
        int postIncrement;
        int postDecrement;
        int positive;
        int negative;
        bool temp;
        preIncrement = ++unOps;
        Console.WriteLine("pre-Increment: {0}", preIncrement);
        preDecrement = --unOps;
        Console.WriteLine("pre-Decrement: {0}", preDecrement);
        postDecrement = unOps--;
        Console.WriteLine("Post-Decrement: {0}", postDecrement);
        postIncrement = unOps++;
        Console.WriteLine("Post-Increment: {0}", postIncrement);
        Console.WriteLine("Final Value of unOps is: {0}", unOps);
        positive = +postIncrement;
        Console.WriteLine("Positive: {0}", positive);
        
        negative = -postIncrement;
        Console.WriteLine("Negative: {0}", negative);
        temp = false;
        temp = !temp;
        Console.WriteLine("Logical Not: {0}", temp);
    }
}

Code Explanation

When evaluating expressions:

  • postIncrement (x++) and postDecrement (x--) operators return their current value and then apply the operators.
  • preIncrement (++x) and preDecrement (--x) operators apply the operators to the variable prior to returning the final value.

In the code ...