In C#, should I use string.Empty or String.Empty or “” to intitialize a string?

Question

In C#, I want to initialize a string value with an empty string.

How should I do this? What is the right way, and why?

string willi = string.Empty;
         


        

Answer 1

I strongly prefer String.Empty, aside from the other reasons to ensure you know what it is and that you have not accidentally removed the contents, but primarily for internationalization. If I see a string in quotes then I always have to wonder whether that is new code and it should be put into a string table. So every time code gets changed/reviewed you need to look for "something in quotes" and yes you can filter out the empty strings but I tell people it is good practice to never put strings in quotes unless you know it won't get localized.