A simple and effective solution to get over the null-pointer tragedy invented by Tony Hoare is to capture the type system deficiency by convention.
Postfixing each variable, field or property name with ‘_’ will make it obvious that a special “treatment” for null is required.
I simply called it the “flatline convention”.
For example:
var descriptor_ = File.Exists("myFile") ? new MyFileDescriptor() : null;
When used with discipline, it should be obvious when to handle null pointers.
yours
armin
Don’t just fix the mistakes — fix whatever permitted the mistake in the first place. – NASA
