How do I determine if an array is initialized in VB6?

Question

Passing an undimensioned array to the VB6's Ubound function will cause an error, so I want to check if it has been dimensioned yet before attempting to check its upper bound. How do I do this?

Answer 1

Note: the code has been updated, the original version can be found in the revision history (not that it is useful to find it). The updated code does not depend on the undocumented GetMem4 function and correctly handles arrays of all types.

Note for VBA users: This code is for VB6 which never got an x64 update. If you intend to use this code for VBA, see https://stackoverflow.com/a/32539884/11683 for the VBA version. You will only need to take the CopyMemory declaration and the pArrPtr function, leaving the rest.

I use this:

Private Declare Sub CopyMemory Lib "kernel32" Alias "RtlMoveMemory" _ (ByRef Destination As Any, ByRef Source As Any, ByVal length As Long)  Private Const VT_BYREF As Long = &H4000&  ' When declared in this way, the passed array is wrapped in a Variant/ByRef. It is not copied. ' Returns *SAFEARRAY, not **SAFEARRAY Public Function pArrPtr(ByRef arr As Variant) As Long   'VarType lies to you, hiding important differences. Manual VarType here.   Dim vt As Integer   CopyMemory ByVal VarPtr(vt), ByVal VarPtr(arr), Len(vt)    If (vt And vbArray) <> vbArray Then     Err.Raise 5, , "Variant must contain an array"   End If    'see https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/ms221627%28v=vs.85%29.aspx   If (vt And VT_BYREF) = VT_BYREF Then     'By-ref variant array. Contains **pparray at offset 8     CopyMemory ByVal VarPtr(pArrPtr), ByVal VarPtr(arr) + 8, Len(pArrPtr)  'pArrPtr = arr->pparray;     CopyMemory ByVal VarPtr(pArrPtr), ByVal pArrPtr, Len(pArrPtr)          'pArrPtr = *pArrPtr;   Else     'Non-by-ref variant array. Contains *parray at offset 8     CopyMemory ByVal VarPtr(pArrPtr), ByVal VarPtr(arr) + 8, Len(pArrPtr)  'pArrPtr = arr->parray;   End If End Function  Public Function ArrayExists(ByRef arr As Variant) As Boolean   ArrayExists = pArrPtr(arr) <> 0 End Function 

Usage:

? ArrayExists(someArray) 

Your code seems to do the same (testing for SAFEARRAY** being NULL), but in a way which I would consider a compiler bug :)

Answer 2

I just thought of this one. Simple enough, no API calls needed. Any problems with it?

Public Function IsArrayInitialized(arr) As Boolean    Dim rv As Long    On Error Resume Next    rv = UBound(arr)   IsArrayInitialized = (Err.Number = 0)  End Function 

Edit: I did discover a flaw with this related to the behavior of the Split function (actually I'd call it a flaw in the Split function). Take this example:

Dim arr() As String  arr = Split(vbNullString, ",") Debug.Print UBound(arr) 

What is the value of Ubound(arr) at this point? It's -1! So, passing this array to this IsArrayInitialized function would return true, but attempting to access arr(0) would cause a subscript out of range error.