.net - How to pass ctor args in Activator.CreateInstance or use IL?

Question

I need a performance enhanced Activator.CreateInstance() and came across this article by Miron Abramson that uses a factory to create the instance in IL and then cache it. (I've included code below from Miron Abramson's site in case it somehow disappears). I'm new to IL Emit code and anything beyond Activator.CreateInstance() for instantiating a class and any help would be much appreciative.

My problem is that I need to create an instance of an object that takes a ctor with a parameter. I see there is a way to pass in the Type of the parameter, but is there a way to pass in the value of the ctor parameter as well?

If possible, I would like to use a method similar to CreateObjectFactory<T>(params object[] constructorParams) as some objects I want to instantiate may have more than 1 ctor param.

// Source: http://mironabramson.com/blog/post/2008/08/Fast-version-of-the-ActivatorCreateInstance-method-using-IL.aspx
public static class FastObjectFactory
{
    private static readonly Hashtable creatorCache = Hashtable.Synchronized(new Hashtable());
    private readonly static Type coType = typeof(CreateObject);
    public delegate object CreateObject();

    /// 
    /// Create an object that will used as a 'factory' to the specified type T 
   /// 
    public static CreateObject CreateObjectFactory() where T : class
    {
        Type t = typeof(T);
        FastObjectFactory.CreateObject c = creatorCache[t] as FastObjectFactory.CreateObject;
        if (c == null)
        {
            lock (creatorCache.SyncRoot)
            {
                c = creatorCache[t] as FastObjectFactory.CreateObject;
                if (c != null)
                {
                    return c;
                }
                DynamicMethod dynMethod = new DynamicMethod("DM$OBJ_FACTORY_" + t.Name, typeof(object), null, t);
                ILGenerator ilGen = dynMethod.GetILGenerator();

                ilGen.Emit(OpCodes.Newobj, t.GetConstructor(Type.EmptyTypes));
                ilGen.Emit(OpCodes.Ret);
                c = (CreateObject)dynMethod.CreateDelegate(coType);
                creatorCache.Add(t, c);
            }
        }
        return c;
    }
}

Update to Miron's code from commentor on his post 2010-01-11

public static class FastObjectFactory2<T> where T : class, new()
{
    public static Func<T> CreateObject { get; private set; }

    static FastObjectFactory2()
    {
        Type objType = typeof(T);
        var dynMethod = new DynamicMethod("DM$OBJ_FACTORY_" + objType.Name, objType, null, objType);
        ILGenerator ilGen = dynMethod.GetILGenerator();
        ilGen.Emit(OpCodes.Newobj, objType.GetConstructor(Type.EmptyTypes));
        ilGen.Emit(OpCodes.Ret);
        CreateObject = (Func<T>)
        dynMethod.CreateDelegate(typeof(Func<T>));
    }
}

Answer 1

I've been doing a bit of testing with this and as a follow-up to Miron's original article (here), I've discovered that the .NET 4.0 Activator is much faster than before. Some results from a version of his app tweaked to show timings in milliseconds:

.NET 3.5 build

Number of iterates: 1000000
Activator.CreateInstance(Type):                           4150
Activator.CreateInstance<T>():                            1288
FastObjectFactory.CreateObjec (empty cache):                33
FastObjectFactory.CreateObjec (cache full):                 28
ItemFactory.GetNewItem:                                   1283


.NET 4.0 build

Number of iterates: 1000000
Activator.CreateInstance(Type):                            138
Activator.CreateInstance<T>():                             151
FastObjectFactory.CreateObjec (empty cache):                28
FastObjectFactory.CreateObjec (cache full):                 22
ItemFactory.GetNewItem:                                    156

However this was for a no-parameter constructor and I also noticed that the activator is still a little slow when constructors with parameters are used, as can bse seen below.

One problem I had with the original solution posted here is that I don't necessarily know the type of the objects I want at compile time - I only have a Type reference. Now (unless I'm being a duffer) that means I can't use the generic solution here or a simple variation on it.

So this is a version I've knocked together which addresses the problem. It also showed up the slight slowness in the .NET 4.0 Activator when constructor parameters are used:

// For use with no-parameter constructors. Also contains constants and utility methods
public static class FastActivator
{
    // THIS VERSION NOT THREAD SAFE YET
    static Dictionary<Type, Func<object>> constructorCache = new Dictionary<Type, Func<object>>();

    private const string DynamicMethodPrefix = "DM$_FastActivator_";

    public static object CreateInstance(Type objType)
    {
        return GetConstructor(objType)();
    }

    public static Func<object> GetConstructor(Type objType)
    {
        Func<object> constructor;
        if (!constructorCache.TryGetValue(objType, out constructor))
        {
            constructor = (Func<object>)FastActivator.BuildConstructorDelegate(objType, typeof(Func<object>), new Type[] { });
            constructorCache.Add(objType, constructor);
        }
        return constructor;
    }

    public static object BuildConstructorDelegate(Type objType, Type delegateType, Type[] argTypes)
    {
        var dynMethod = new DynamicMethod(DynamicMethodPrefix + objType.Name + "$" + argTypes.Length.ToString(), objType, argTypes, objType);
        ILGenerator ilGen = dynMethod.GetILGenerator();
        for (int argIdx = 0; argIdx < argTypes.Length; argIdx++)
        {
            ilGen.Emit(OpCodes.Ldarg, argIdx);
        }
        ilGen.Emit(OpCodes.Newobj, objType.GetConstructor(argTypes));
        ilGen.Emit(OpCodes.Ret);
        return dynMethod.CreateDelegate(delegateType);
    }
}

// For use with one-parameter constructors, argument type = T1
public static class FastActivator<T1>
{
    // THIS VERSION NOT THREAD SAFE YET
    static Dictionary<Type, Func<T1, object>> constructorCache = new Dictionary<Type, Func<T1, object>>();
    public static object CreateInstance(Type objType, T1 arg1)
    {
        return GetConstructor(objType, new Type[] { typeof(T1) })(arg1);
    }
    public static Func<T1, object> GetConstructor(Type objType, Type[] argTypes)
    {
        Func<T1, object> constructor;
        if (!constructorCache.TryGetValue(objType, out constructor))
        {
            constructor = (Func<T1, object>)FastActivator.BuildConstructorDelegate(objType, typeof(Func<T1, object>), argTypes);
            constructorCache.Add(objType, constructor);
        }
        return constructor;
    }
}

// For use with two-parameter constructors, argument types = T1, T2
public static class FastActivator<T1, T2>
{
    // THIS VERSION NOT THREAD SAFE YET
    static Dictionary<Type, Func<T1, T2, object>> constructorCache = new Dictionary<Type, Func<T1, T2, object>>();
    public static object CreateInstance(Type objType, T1 arg1, T2 arg2)
    {
        return GetConstructor(objType, new Type[] { typeof(T1), typeof(T2) })(arg1, arg2);
    }

    public static Func<T1, T2, object> GetConstructor(Type objType, Type[] argTypes)
    {
        Func<T1, T2, object> constructor;
        if (!constructorCache.TryGetValue(objType, out constructor))
        {
            constructor = (Func<T1, T2, object>)FastActivator.BuildConstructorDelegate(objType, typeof(Func<T1, T2, object>), argTypes);
            constructorCache.Add(objType, constructor);
        }
        return constructor;
    }
}

// For use with three-parameter constructors, argument types = T1, T2, T3
// NB: could possibly merge these FastActivator<T1,...> classes and avoid generic type parameters
// but would need to take care that cache entries were keyed to distinguish constructors having 
// the same number of parameters but of different types. Keep separate for now.
public static class FastActivator<T1, T2, T3>
{
    // THIS VERSION NOT THREAD SAFE YET
    static Dictionary<Type, Func<T1, T2, T3, object>> constructorCache = new Dictionary<Type, Func<T1, T2, T3, object>>();
    public static object CreateInstance(Type objType, T1 arg1, T2 arg2, T3 arg3)
    {
        return GetConstructor(objType, new Type[] { typeof(T1), typeof(T2), typeof(T3) })(arg1, arg2, arg3);
    }

    public static Func<T1, T2, T3, object> GetConstructor(Type objType, Type[] argTypes)
    {
        Func<T1, T2, T3, object> constructor;
        if (!constructorCache.TryGetValue(objType, out constructor))
        {
            constructor = (Func<T1, T2, T3, object>)FastActivator.BuildConstructorDelegate(objType, typeof(Func<T1, T2, T3, object>), argTypes);
            constructorCache.Add(objType, constructor);
        }
        return constructor;
    }
}

Some performance results below. Note this is for creation of 1 million objects and timings in milliseconds again:

Activator.CreateInstance(objType) - parameterless constructor: 153
FastActivator.CreateInstance(objType) - parameterless constructor: 86
Using FastActivator.GetConstructor and calling it repeatedly - parameterless constructor: 34
Activator.CreateInstance(objType) with 1 constructor arg: 3183
FastActivator.CreateInstance(objType) with 1 constructor arg: 257
FastActivator.GetConstructor and calling it repeatedly with 1 constructor arg: 126
Activator.CreateInstance(objType) with 3 constructor args: 4403
FastActivator.CreateInstance(objType) with 3 constructor args: 640
FastActivator.GetConstructor and calling it repeatedly with 3 constructor args : 405
FastActivator.GetConstructor and calling it repeatedly with 3 constructor args; args created only once : 19