arrayVariable() As Object vs. arrayVariable As Object() – not the same in Property declaration?

Question

Until today, I thought that the following two notations are the same (edit: Dim was replaced by Property)

Property arrayVariable() As Object 
Property arrayVariable As Object()

Today I found that former one throws error Option Strict On disallows late binding. while the latter compiles OK in expression dictionary1.TryGetValue(CStr(arrayVariable(0)), result).

Please what is the difference between them?

I would always use the second notation if it also allowed to specify the array dimensions. It doesn't, so I stuck with the first form (less clean one, because part of type specification - parenthesis - are before As) in order to be consistent across declarations. And now I see that even the first one isn't universal...

It really looks like a weak point of Visual Basic that two forms exist for one thing and their usage is not straightforward but has catches like this.

Full source code reproducing the issue:

Public Class Class1
    Dim _A1() As Object
    Dim _A2() As Object

    ReadOnly Property A1() As Object ' 1st form of declaration
        Get
            Return _A1
        End Get
    End Property

    ReadOnly Property A2 As Object() ' 2nd form of declaration
        Get
            Return _A2
        End Get
    End Property
End Class

Sub Main()
    Dim c1 As New Class1
    Dim d1 As New Dictionary(Of String, String)
    Dim value As String = ""
    d1.TryGetValue(CStr(c1.A1(0)), value)  '<- Option Strict On disallows late binding.
    d1.TryGetValue(CStr(c1.A2(0)), value)  '<- No error here.
End Sub

Answer 1

The problem is that they are Properties so the () is ignored as an Array specifier and thinks of it as an empty parameter collection. Look at how the compiler see them - even the compiler thinks you had an Object and not a Object() and so in your example the A1(0) is an index of an object which is not defined so it thinks you have done some late binding and made it accept an array.

If you are not using a Property and an Object type either declaration is valid.

Dim data() As String

Same as

Dim data As String()

If you highlight either variable the intellisence shows you:

 Dim data() As String

Answer 2

Here's the minimum amount of code required to replicate your issue:

Dim y As Object
Dim x = y(0)

This has nothing to do with the declaration of arrays. You're just trying to convert an Object to an array which option strict doesn't allow.

Answer 3

Additional notes:

(not sure why this has been downvoted)

Changing Object to Integer reveals the first form mentioned in question is not taken as declaration.

Public Class Class1
    Dim _A1 As Integer()
    Dim _A2 As Integer()

    ReadOnly Property A1() As Integer
        Get
            Return _A1 
          ' error at above line: Value of type '1-dimensional array of Integer' cannot
          ' be converted to 'Integer'.
        End Get
    End Property
    ReadOnly Property A2 As Integer()
        Get
            Return _A2
        End Get
    End Property
End Class

Proper way is

    ReadOnly Property A1() As Integer()