Lookup property in object graph via a string

I've had to some something similar in the past. I went with the lambda approach because after compiling them I can cache them. I've removed the caching in this code.

I included a few unit tests to show the usage of the method. I hope this is helpful.

private static object GetValueForPropertyOrField( object objectThatContainsPropertyName, IEnumerable<string> properties )
  {
     foreach ( var property in properties )
     {
        Type typeOfCurrentObject = objectThatContainsPropertyName.GetType();

        var parameterExpression = Expression.Parameter( typeOfCurrentObject, "obj" );
        Expression memberExpression = Expression.PropertyOrField( parameterExpression, property );

        var expression = Expression.Lambda( Expression.GetDelegateType( typeOfCurrentObject, memberExpression.Type ), memberExpression, parameterExpression ).Compile();

        objectThatContainsPropertyName = expression.DynamicInvoke( objectThatContainsPropertyName );
     }

     return objectThatContainsPropertyName;
  }

  [TestMethod]
  public void TestOneProperty()
  {
     var dateTime = new DateTime();

     var result = GetValueForPropertyOrField( dateTime, new[] { "Day" } );

     Assert.AreEqual( dateTime.Day, result );
  }

  [TestMethod]
  public void TestNestedProperties()
  {
     var dateTime = new DateTime();

     var result = GetValueForPropertyOrField( dateTime,  new[] { "Date", "Day" } );

     Assert.AreEqual( dateTime.Date.Day, result );
  }

  [TestMethod]
  public void TestDifferentNestedProperties()
  {
     var dateTime = new DateTime();

     var result = GetValueForPropertyOrField( dateTime, new[] { "Date", "DayOfWeek" } );

     Assert.AreEqual( dateTime.Date.DayOfWeek, result );
  }

Here's a non-recursive version with (almost) the same semantics:

private static object ObjectFromString(object basePoint, IEnumerable<string> pathToSearch)
{
    var value = basePoint;
    foreach (var propertyName in pathToSearch)
    {
        var property = value.GetType().GetProperty(propertyName);
        if (property == null) return null;
        value = property.GetValue(value, null);
    }
    return value;
}

You could simply use the standard .NET DataBinder.Eval Method, like this:

object result = DataBinder.Eval(myPerson, "PersonsAddress.HousePhone.Number");