C# Language LINQ Queries SelectMany: Flattening a sequence of sequences
Example
var sequenceOfSequences = new [] { new [] { 1, 2, 3 }, new [] { 4, 5 }, new [] { 6 } };
var sequence = sequenceOfSequences.SelectMany(x => x);
// returns { 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 }
Use SelectMany() if you have, or you are creating a sequence of sequences, but you want the result as one long sequence.
In LINQ Query Syntax:
var sequence = from subSequence in sequenceOfSequences
from item in subSequence
select item;
If you have a collection of collections and would like to be able to work on data from parent and child collection at the same time, it is also possible with SelectMany.
Let's define simple classes
public class BlogPost
{
public int Id { get; set; }
public string Content { get; set; }
public List<Comment> Comments { get; set; }
}
public class Comment
{
public int Id { get; set; }
public string Content { get; set; }
}
Let's assume we have following collection.
List<BlogPost> posts = new List<BlogPost>()
{
new BlogPost()
{
Id = 1,
Comments = new List<Comment>()
{
new Comment()
{
Id = 1,
Content = "It's really great!",
},
new Comment()
{
Id = 2,
Content = "Cool post!"
}
}
},
new BlogPost()
{
Id = 2,
Comments = new List<Comment>()
{
new Comment()
{
Id = 3,
Content = "I don't think you're right",
},
new Comment()
{
Id = 4,
Content = "This post is a complete nonsense"
}
}
}
};
Now we want to select comments Content along with Id of BlogPost associated with this comment. In order to do so, we can use appropriate SelectMany overload.
var commentsWithIds = posts.SelectMany(p => p.Comments, (post, comment) => new { PostId = post.Id, CommentContent = comment.Content });
Our commentsWithIds looks like this
{
PostId = 1,
CommentContent = "It's really great!"
},
{
PostId = 1,
CommentContent = "Cool post!"
},
{
PostId = 2,
CommentContent = "I don't think you're right"
},
{
PostId = 2,
CommentContent = "This post is a complete nonsense"
}
