How can I get the correct text definition of a generic type using reflection?

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There is no built-in way to get this representation in the .Net Framework. Namely because there is no way to get it correct. There are a good number of constructs that are not representable in C# style syntax. For instance “<>foo” is a valid type name in IL but cannot be represented in C#.

However, if you’re looking for a pretty good solution it can be hand implemented fairly quickly. The below solution will work for most situations. It will not handle

  1. Nested Types
  2. Illegal C# Names
  3. Couple of other scenarios

Example:

public static string GetFriendlyTypeName(Type type) {
    if (type.IsGenericParameter)
    {
        return type.Name;
    }

    if (!type.IsGenericType)
    {
        return type.FullName;
    }

    var builder = new System.Text.StringBuilder();
    var name = type.Name;
    var index = name.IndexOf("`");
    builder.AppendFormat("{0}.{1}", type.Namespace, name.Substring(0, index));
    builder.Append('<');
    var first = true;
    foreach (var arg in type.GetGenericArguments())
    {
        if (!first)
        {
            builder.Append(',');
        }
        builder.Append(GetFriendlyTypeName(arg));
        first = false;
    }
    builder.Append('>');
    return builder.ToString();
}

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