39. The this keyword

As we navigate the realm of object oriented programming in C#, we encounter scenarios where we need a way to refer to the current instance of a class. The this keyword serves this purpose, providing a clear and unambiguous way to access the current object’s members, enhancing code readability and maintainability.

The this keyword in C#, refers to the current instance of the class. It is used inside the class’s methods and properties to refer to the fields, methods, or properties of the class.

One common use of this is to resolve ambiguity between instance variables and parameters, especially in constructors or methods where parameter names might be the same as instance variable names.

Consider this example:

public class Car
{
    private string make;
    private string color;

    // Constructor with parameters
    public Car(string make, string color)
    {
        this.make = make;
        this.color = color;
    }
}

The below script needs to be able to find the current output cell; this is an easy method to get it.

In this Car class, make and color are instance variables and they have the same names as constructor parameters. The this keyword is used to differentiate the instance variables from the parameters. So this.make refers to the instance variable make, not the parameter make.

Had we not used the this keyword then we would instead have said make = make which means that we would have assigned the argument make to itself.

The keyword this can also be used to call one constructor from another within the same class, a practice known as constructor chaining. But we’ll talk about this in a later chapter.

Remember, using the this keyword isn’t always necessary, but it can improve code readability and reduce confusion, especially when instance members (such as fields) and local variables or functions share the same names.