How to initialize get-only property C#

Question

I have a class like this:

public class Customer
{
  public int Id { get; set; }
  public string FullName { get; set; }
  public string Address{ get; }
}

How may I initialize an instance of this class and setup the 'Address' get-only property value? I've tried with

var customer = new Customer 
{
  Id = 228,
  FullName = "Peter",
  Address = "Kreshatik",
};

but it it doesn't work.

Please, note that it's not my class and I have no ability to change anything there.

Answer 1

Absolutely agree with previous answer by @rfmodulator, under given circumstances reflection is the only possible solution. My steps to resolve this issue would be:

• check for parameters in all constructors
• check for public setter methods
• if you have access to source code, check for Address references (maybe the original purpose was something completely different and there is a reason why its setter is restricted)
• contact author
• reflection

Answer 2

//using System.Reflection;

var backingField = typeof(Customer).GetField("<Address>k__BackingField", BindingFlags.NonPublic | BindingFlags.Instance);

var customer = new Customer
{
    Id = 228,
    FullName = "Peter",
};

backingField.SetValue(customer, "Kreshatik");

If backingField is null you'll need to dig deeper with reflection to find it.

You can use GetFields(...) with the same flags to list them.