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Similarity and Differences Between C# and Java

In this tutorial, we will learn about the similarity and differences between C# and Java programming languages?
By IncludeHelp Last updated : April 06, 2023

Overview

C#.Net and Java both are the programming languages, which are most popular and widely used. In this post we are going to learn about C#.Net and Java similarities and dissimilarities (differences between of them).

C# and Java - Similarities

1. C# and Java both are the object oriented programming languages.
2. C# and Java both are the languages descended from C and C++.
3. Both C# and Java compilers generate an intermediate language code after compilation:
   1. C# compiler generates Microsoft Intermediate Language (MSIL), and Java compiler generates Java byte code.
   2. In each case the intermediate code can be run - by interpretation or just-in-time compilation - on an appropriate virtual machine.
   3. In C#, however, more support is given for the further compilation of the intermediate language code into native code.
4. Both languages include advanced features, like garbage collection, which remove some of the low level maintenance tasks from the programmer.
5. In a lot of areas they are syntactically similar.
6. Just like java, C# programming also gives up on multiple class inheritance in favor of a single inheritance model. C# supports the multiple inheritances of interfaces.

C# and Java - Key Differences

1. C# developed by Microsoft, while Java developed by sun-microsystem.
2. Founder of C# is Anders Hejlsberg. And Founder of JAVA is James Gosling.
3. C# contains more fundamental data types than Java, and also allows more extension to the value types.
   1. C# supports enumerations, type-safe value types which are limited to a defined set of constant variables, and structures, which are user-defined value types.
   2. Java doesn't have enumerations, but can specify a class to emulate them.
4. Java does not support operator overloading while C# supports operator overloading of multiple operators.
5. In Java programming, the concept of jagged array is introduced; these (jagged arrays) are implemented solely with single-dimensional arrays where arrays can be members of other arrays. In C#, we can also implement genuine rectangular arrays (which may the replacement of jagged array)
6. Concept of class properties used in C#. It does not supported by JAVA.
7. JAVA does not support delegates, while C# uses delegates, which are type-safe method pointers. These are used to implement event-handling.
8. C# uses CLR (Common Language Runtime) while JAVA uses JVM (Java Virtual Machine).

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