Semicolons in C#

Question

Why are semicolons necessary at the end of each line in C#? Why can't the complier just know where each line is ended?

Answer 1

The line terminator character will make you be able to break a statement across multiple lines.

On the other hand, languages like VB have a line continuation character. I personally think it's much cleaner to terminate statements with a semicolon rather than continue using underscores.

Answer 2

No, the compiler doesn't know that a line break is for statement termination, nor should it. It allows you to carry a statement to multilines if you like.

See:

string sql = @"SELECT foo                FROM bar                WHERE baz=42"; 

Or how about large method overloads:

CallMyMethod(thisIsSomethingForArgument1,              thisIsSomethingForArgument2,              thisIsSomethingForArgument2,              thisIsSomethingForArgument3,              thisIsSomethingForArgument4,              thisIsSomethingForArgument5,              thisIsSomethingForArgument6); 

And the reverse, the semi-colon also allows multi-statement lines:

string s = ""; int i = 0;