With the release of Visual Studio 2017 update 3, the new C# 7.1 features became available.

To use the new features, the .csproj file can be modified and the <LangVersion> element set to either “latest” (the newest release including minor releases) or explicitly to “7.1” , for example:

<LangVersion>latest</LangVersion>

or

<LangVersion>7.1</LangVersion>

To select one of these in Visual Studio,  go to the project properties and the build tab and choose the “Advanced…” button as the following screenshot shows:

Now the new features of C# 7.1 including  asynchronous main methods are available.

C# 7.1 Async Main Methods

With C# 7.0, in a console app the entry point could not be marked async requiring some workarounds/boilerplate code, for example:

class Program
{
    static void Main(string[] args)
    {
       MainAsync().GetAwaiter().GetResult();
    }

    private static async Task MainAsync()
    {
        using (StreamWriter writer = File.CreateText(@"c:\temp\anewfile.txt"))
        {
            await writer.WriteLineAsync("Hello");
        }
    }
}

With C# 7.1, the main method can be async, as the following code shows:

class Program
{
    static async Task Main(string[] args)
    {
        using (StreamWriter writer = File.CreateText(@"c:\temp\anewfile.txt"))
        {
            await writer.WriteLineAsync("Hello");
        }
    }
}

You can check out the C#7.1 features on GitHub such as:

• Tuple projection initializers
• Pattern-matching with generics
• Default expressions
• Async Main

If you want to fill in the gaps in your C# knowledge be sure to check out my C# Tips and Traps training course from Pluralsight – get started with a free trial.

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