Convert Nulls to Empty String in an object

Question

What is the easiest way to take an objects and convert any of its values from null to string.empty ?

I was thinking about a routine that I can pass in any object, but I am not sure how to loop through all the values.

Answer 1

When your object exposes it's values via properties you can write something like:

string Value { get { return m_Value ?? string.Empty; } }

Another solution is to use reflection. This code will check properties of type string:

var myObject = new MyObject();
foreach( var propertyInfo in myObject.GetType().GetProperties() )
{
    if(propertyInfo.PropertyType == typeof(string))
    {
        if( propertyInfo.GetValue( myObject, null ) == null )
        {
            propertyInfo.SetValue( myObject, string.Empty, null );
        }
    }
}

Answer 2

Using reflection, you could something similar to :

public static class Extensions
{
    public static void Awesome<T>(this T myObject) where T : class
    {
        PropertyInfo[] properties = typeof(T).GetProperties();
        foreach(var info in properties)
        {
            // if a string and null, set to String.Empty
            if(info.PropertyType == typeof(string) && 
               info.GetValue(myObject, null) == null)
            {
                info.SetValue(myObject, String.Empty, null);
            }
        }
    }
}