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Non-nullable reference types' default values VS non-nullable value types' default values

This isn't my first question about nullable reference types as it's been few months I'm experiencing with it. But the more I'm experiencing it, the more I'm confused and the less I see the value added by that feature.
Take this code for example
string? nullableString = default(string?);
string nonNullableString = default(string);
int? nullableInt = default(int?);
int nonNullableInt = default(int);
Executing that gives:
nullableString => null
nonNullableString => null
nullableInt => null
nonNullableInt => 0
The default value of an (non-nullable) integer has always been 0 but
to me it doesn't make sense a non-nullable string's default value is null.
Why this choice? This is opposed to the non-nullable principles we've always been used to.
I think the default non-nullable string's default value should have been String.Empty.
I mean somewhere deep down in the implementation of C# it must be specified that 0 is the default value of an int. We also could have chosen 1 or 2 but no, the consensus is 0. So can't we just specify the default value of a string is String.Empty when the Nullable reference type feature is activated? Moreover it seems Microsoft would like to activate it by default with .NET 5 projects in a near future so this feature would become the normal behavior.
Now same example with an object:
Foo? nullableFoo = default(Foo?);
Foo nonNullableFoo = default(Foo);
This gives:
nullableFoo => null
nonNullableFoo => null
Again this doesn't make sense to me, in my opinion the default value of a Foo should be new Foo() (or gives a compile error if no parameterless constructor is available).
Why by default setting to null an object that isn't supposed to be null?
Now extending this question even more
string nonNullableString = null;
int nonNullableInt = null;
The compiler gives a warning for the 1st line which could be transformed into an error with a simple configuration in our .csproj file: <WarningsAsErrors>CS8600</WarningsAsErrors>.
And it gives a compilation error for the 2nd line as expected.
So the behavior between non-nullable value types and non-nullable reference types isn't the same but this is acceptable since I can override it.
However when doing that:
string nonNullableString = null!;
int nonNullableInt = null!;
The compiler is completely fine with the 1st line, no warning at all.
I discovered null! recently when experiencing with the nullable reference type feature and I was expecting the compiler to be fine for the 2nd line too but this isn't the case. Now I'm just really confused as for why Microsoft decided to implement different behaviors.
Considering it doesn't protect at all against having null in a non-nullable reference type variable, it seems this new feature doesn't change anything and doesn't improve developers' lives at all (as opposed to non-nullable value types which could NOT be null and therefore don't need to be null-checked)
So at the end it seems the only value added is just in terms of signatures. Developers can now be explicit whether or not a method's return value could be null or not or if a property could be null or not (for example in a C# representation of a database table where NULL is an allowed value in a column).
Beside that I don't see how can I efficiently use this new feature, could you please give me other useful examples on how you use nullable reference types?
I really would like to make good use of this feature to improve my developer's life but I really don't see how...
Thank you

You are very confused by how programming language design works.
Default values
The default value of an (non-nullable) integer has always been 0 but to me it doesn't make sense a non-nullable string's default value is null. Why this choice? This is completely against non-nullable principles we've always been used to. I think the default non-nullable string's default value should have been String.Empty.
Default values for variables are a basic feature of the language that is in C# since the very beginning. The specification defines the default values:
For a variable of a value_type, the default value is the same as the value computed by the value_type's default constructor ([see] Default constructors).
For a variable of a reference_type, the default value is null.
This makes sense from a practical standpoint, as one of the basic usages of defaults is when declaring a new array of values of a given type. Thanks to this definition, the runtime can just zero all the bits in the allocated array - default constructors for value types are always all-zero values in all fields and null is represented as an all-zero reference. That's literally the next line in the spec:
Initialization to default values is typically done by having the memory manager or garbage collector initialize memory to all-bits-zero before it is allocated for use. For this reason, it is convenient to use all-bits-zero to represent the null reference.
Now Nullable Reference Types feature (NRT) was released last year with C#8. The choice here is not "let's implement default values to be null in spite of NRT" but rather "let's not waste time and resources trying to completely rework how the default keyword works because we're introducing NRTs". NRTs are annotations for programmers, by design they have zero impact on the runtime.
I would argue that not being able to specify default values for reference types is a similar case as for not being able to define a parameterless constructor on a value type - runtime needs a fast all-zero default and null values are a reasonable default for reference types. Not all types will have a reasonable default value - what is a reasonable default for a TcpClient?
If you want your own custom default, implement a static Default method or property and document it so that the developers can use that as a default for that type. No need to change the fundamentals of the language.
I mean somewhere deep down in the implementation of C# it must be specified that 0 is the default value of an int. We also could have chosen 1 or 2 but no, the consensus is 0. So can't we just specify the default value of a string is String.Empty when the Nullable reference type feature is activated?
As I said, the deep down is that zeroing a range of memory is blazingly fast and convenient. There is no runtime component responsible for checking what the default of a given type is and repeating that value in an array when you create a new one, since that would be horribly inefficient.
Your proposal would basically mean that the runtime would have to somehow inspect the nullability metadata of strings at runtime and treat an all-zero non-nullable string value as an empty string. This would be a very involved change digging deep into the runtime just for this one special case of an empty string. It's much more cost-efficient to just use a static analyzer to warn you when you're assigning null instead of a sensible default to a non-nullable string. Fortunately we have such analyzer, namely the NRT feature, which consistently refuses to compile my classes that contain definitions like this:
string Foo { get; set; }
by issuing a warning and forcing me to change that to:
string Foo { get; set; } = "";
(I recommend turning on Treat Warnings As Errors by the way, but it's a matter of taste.)
Again this doesn't make sense to me, in my opinion the default value of a Foo should be new Foo() (or gives a compile error if no parameterless constructor is available). Why by default setting to null an object that isn't supposed to be null?
This would, among other things, render you unable to declare an array of a reference type without a default constructor. Most basic collections use an array as the underlying storage, including List<T>. And it would require you to allocate N default instances of a type whenever you make an array of size N, which is again, horribly inefficient. Also the constructor can have side effects. I'm not going to further ponder how many things this would break, suffice to say it's hardly an easy change to make. Considering how complicated NRT was to implement anyway (the NullableReferenceTypesTests.cs file in the Roslyn repo has ~130,000 lines of code alone), the cost-efficiency of introducing such a change is... not great.
The bang operator (!) and Nullable Value Types
The compiler is completely fine with the 1st line, no warning at all. I discovered null! recently when experiencing with the nullable reference type feature and I was expecting the compiler to be fine for the 2nd line too but this isn't the case. Now I'm just really confused as for why Microsoft decided to implement different behaviors.
The null value is valid only for reference types and nullable value types. Nullable types are, again, defined in the spec:
A nullable type can represent all values of its underlying type plus an additional null value. A nullable type is written T?, where T is the underlying type. This syntax is shorthand for System.Nullable<T>, and the two forms can be used interchangeably. (...) An instance of a nullable type T? has two public read-only properties:
A HasValue property of type bool
A Value property of type T
An instance for which HasValue is true is said to be non-null. A non-null instance contains a known value and Value returns that value.
The reason for which you can't assign a null to int is rather obvious - int is a value type that takes 32-bits and represents an integer. The null value is a special reference value that is machine-word sized and represents a location in memory. Assigning null to int has no sensible semantics. Nullable<T> exists specifically for the purpose of allowing null assignments to value types to represent "no value" scenarios. But note that doing
int? x = null;
is purely syntactic sugar. The all-zero value of Nullable<T> is the "no value" scenario, since it means that HasValue is false. There is no magic null value being assigned anywhere, it's the same as saying = default -- it just creates a new all-zero struct of the given type T and assigns it.
So again, the answer is -- no one deliberately tried to design this to work incompatibly with NRTs. Nullable value types are a much more fundamental feature of the language that works like this since its introduction in C#2. And the way you propose it to work doesn't translate to a sensible implementation - would you want all value types to be nullable? Then all of them would have to have the HasValue field that takes an additional byte and possible screws up padding (I think a language that represents ints as a 40-bit type and not 32 would be considered heretical :) ).
The bang operator is used specifically to tell the compiler "I know that I'm dereferencing a nullable/assigning null to a non-nullable, but I'm smarter than you and I know for a fact this is not going to break anything". It disables static analysis warnings. But it does not magically expand the underlying type to accommodate for a null value.
Summary
Considering it doesn't protect at all against having null in a non-nullable reference type variable, it seems this new feature doesn't change anything and doesn't improve developers' life at all (as opposed to non-nullable value types which could NOT be null and therefore don't need to be null-checked)
So at the end it seems the only value added is just in terms of signatures. Developers can now be explicit whether or not a method's return value could be null or not or if a property could be null or not (for example in a C# representation of a database table where NULL is an allowed value in a column).
From the official docs on NRTs:
This new feature provides significant benefits over the handling of reference variables in earlier versions of C# where the design intent can't be determined from the variable declaration. The compiler didn't provide safety against null reference exceptions for reference types (...) These warnings are emitted at compile time. The compiler doesn't add any null checks or other runtime constructs in a nullable context. At runtime, a nullable reference and a non-nullable reference are equivalent.
So you're right in that "the only value added is just in terms of signatures" and static analysis, which is the reason we have signatures in the first place. And that is not an improvement on developers' lives? Note that your line
string nonNullableString = default(string);
gives off a warning. If you did not ignore it (or even better, had Treat Warnings As Errors on) you'd get value - the compiler found a bug in your code for you.
Does it protect you from assigning null to a non-null reference type at runtime? No. Does it improve developers' lives? Thousand times yes. The power of the feature comes from warnings and nullable analysis done at compile time. If you ignore warnings issued by NRT, you're doing it at your own peril. The fact that you can ignore the compiler's helpful hand does not make it useless. After all you can just as well put your entire code in an unsafe context and program in C, doesn't mean that C# is useless since you can circumvent its safety guarantees.

Again this doesn't make sense to me, in my opinion the default value of a Foo should be new Foo() (or gives a compile error if no parameterless constructor is available)
That's an opinion, but: that isn't how it is implemented. default means null for reference-types, even if it is invalid according to nullability rules. The compiler spots this and warns you about it on the line Foo nonNullableFoo = default(Foo);:
Warning CS8600 Converting null literal or possible null value to non-nullable type.
As for string nonNullableString = null!; and
The compiler is completely fine with the 1st line, no warning at all.
You told it to ignore it; that's what the ! means. If you tell the compiler to not complain about something, it isn't valid to complain that it didn't complain.
So at the end it seems the only value added is just in terms of signatures.
No, it has lots more validity, but if you ignore the warnings that it does raise (CS8600 above), and if you suppress the other things that it does for you (!): yes, it will be less useful. So... don't do that?

Reference types vs Nullable types ToString()

Could someone please be kind enough to explain why calling ToString() on an empty reference type causes an exception (which in my mind makes perfect sense, you cant invoke a method on nothing!) but calling ToString() on an empty Nullable(Of T) returns String.Empty? This was quite a surprise to me as I assumed the behaviour would be consistent across types.
Nullable<Guid> value = null;
Stock stock = null;
string result = value.ToString(); //Returns empty string
string result1 = stock.ToString(); //Causes a NullReferenceException

Nullable<T> is actually a struct that has some compiler support and implementation support to behave like a null without actually being null.
What you are seeing is the collision between the implementation allowing you to treat it naturally as a null as you would any other reference type, but allowing the method call to happen because the Nullable<T> isn't actually null, the value inside it is null.
Visually it looks like it shouldn't work, this is simply because you cannot see what is done in the background for you.
Other such visual trickery can be seen when you call an extension method on a null reference type... the call works (against visual expectation) because under the hood it is resolved into a static method call passing your null instance as a parameter.
How does a Nullable<T> type work behind the scenes?

Nullable is a value type and the assignment to null causes it to be initialized with Value=null and HasValue=false.
Further, Nullable.ToString() is implement as follows:
public override string ToString()
{
if (!this.HasValue)
{
return "";
}
return this.value.ToString();
}
So what you are seeing is expected.

It is a bit tricky with nullable types. When you set it to null it is actualy not null cause it is not reference type (it is value type). When you initialize such variable with null it creates new sctructure instance where HasValue property is false and it's Value is null, so when you call ToString method it works well on structure instance.

The exception raised by calling default(object).ToString() is called NullReferenceException for a reason, it's calling a method on a null reference. default(int?) on the other hand, is not a null reference, because it's not a reference; it is a value type with a value that is equivalent to null.
The big practical point, is that if this was done, then the following would fail:
default(int?).HasValue // should return false, or throw an exception?
It would also screw-up the way we have some ability to mix nullables and non-nullables:
((int?)null).Equals(1) // should return false, or throw an exception?
And the following becomes completely useless:
default(int?).GetValueOrDefault(-1);
We could get rid of HasValue and force comparison with null, but then what if the equality override of the value-type that is made nullable can return true when compared to null in some cases. That may not be a great idea, but it can be done and the language has to cope.
Let's think back to why nullable types are introduced. The possibility that a reference type can be null, is inherent in the concept of reference types unless effort is taken to enforce non-nullability: Reference types are types that refer to something, and that implies the possibility of one not referring to anything, which we call null.
While a nuisance in many cases, we can make use of this in a variety of cases, such as representing "unknown value", "no valid value" and so on (we can use it for what null means in databases, for example).
At this point, we've given null a meaning in a given context, beyond the simple fact that a given reference doesn't refer to any object.
Since this is useful, we could therefore want to set an int or DateTime to null, but we can't because they aren't types that refer to something else, and hence can't be in a state of not referring to anything any more than I as a mammal can lose my feathers.
The nullable types introduced with 2.0 give us a form of value types that can have the semantic null, through a different mechanism than that of reference types. Most of this you could code yourself if it didn't exist, but special boxing and promotion rules allow for more sensible boxing and operator use.
Okay. Now let's consider why NullReferenceExceptions happen in the first place. Two are inevitable, and one was a design decision in C# (and doesn't apply to all of .NET).
You try to call a virtual method or property, or access a field on a null reference. This has to fail, because there's no way to look up what override should be called, and no such field.
You call a non-virtual method or property on a null reference which in turn calls a virtual method or property, or accesses a field. This is obviously a variant on point one, but the design decision we're coming to next has the advantage of guaranteeing this fails at the start, rather than part-way through (which could be confusing and have long-term side-effects).
You call a non-virtual method or property on a null reference which does not call a virtual method or property, or access a field. There's no inherent reason why this should not be allowed, and some languages allow it, but in C# they decided to use callvirt rather than call to force a NullReferenceException for the sake of consistency (can't say I agree, but there you go).
None of these cases apply in any way to a nullable value type. It is impossible to put a nullable value type into a condition in which there is no way to know which field or method override to access. The whole concept of NullReferenceException just doesn't make sense here.
In all, not throwing a NullReferenceException is consistent with the other types - types through it if and only if a null reference is used.
Note that there is a case where calling on a null nullable-type throws, it does so with GetType(), because GetType() is not virtual, and when called on a value-type there is always an implied boxing. This is true of other value types so:
(1).GetType()
is treated as:
((object)1).GetType()
But in the case of nullable types, boxing turns those with a false HasValue into null, and hence:
default(int?).GetType()
being treated as:
((object)default(int?)).GetType()
which results in GetType() being called on a null object, and hence throwing.
This incidentally brings us to why not faking NullReferenceType was the more sensible design decision - people who need that behaviour can always box. If you want it to through then use ((object)myNullableValue).GetString() so there's no need for the language to treat it as a special case to force the exception.
EDIT
Oh, I forgot to mention the mechanics behind NullReferenceException.
The test for NullReferenceException is very cheap, because it mostly just ignores the problem, and then catches the exception from the OS if it happens. In other words, there is no test.
See What is the CLR implementation behind raising/generating a null reference exception? and note how none of that would work with nullable value types.

If you investigate Nullable<> definition, there is an override ToString definition. In this function, ToString is overriden to return String.Empty.
// Summary:
// Returns the text representation of the value of the current System.Nullable<T>
// object.
//
// Returns:
// The text representation of the value of the current System.Nullable<T> object
// if the System.Nullable<T>.HasValue property is true, or an empty string ("")
// if the System.Nullable<T>.HasValue property is false.
public override string ToString();
On the otherhand, Stock is a custom class, which I assume ToString is not overriden. Thus it returns NullReferenceException since it uses default behaviour.

As per MSDN Remarks
Guid.ToSTring() method Returns a string representation of the
value of this Guid instance, according to the provided format
specifier.
As per MSDN Remarks on Nullable
A type is said to be nullable if it can be assigned a value or can be
assigned null, which means the type has no value whatsoever.
Consequently, a nullable type can express a value, or that no value
exists. For example, a reference type such as String is nullable,
whereas a value type such as Int32 is not. A value type cannot be
nullable because it has enough capacity to express only the values
appropriate for that type; it does not have the additional capacity
required to express a value of null.

Why can the as operator be used with Nullable<T>?

According to the documentation of the as operator, as "is used to perform certain types of conversions between compatible reference types". Since Nullable is actually a value type, I would expect as not to work with it. However, this code compiles and runs:
object o = 7;
int i = o as int? ?? -1;
Console.WriteLine(i); // output: 7
Is this correct behavior? Is the documentation for as wrong? Am I missing something?

Is this correct behavior?
Yes.
Is the documentation for as wrong?
Yes. I have informed the documentation manager. Thanks for bringing this to my attention, and apologies for the error. Obviously no one remembered to update this page when nullable types were added to the language in C# 2.0.
Am I missing something?
You might consider reading the actual C# specification rather than the MSDN documentation; it is more definitive.

I read:
Note that the as operator only performs reference conversions and boxing conversions. The as operator cannot perform other conversions, such as user-defined conversions, which should instead be performed by using cast expressions.
And boxing conversions.....

Just a guess, but I'd say it boxes o as an integer and then converts it to a nullable.

From the documentation about the as keyword:
It is equivalent to the following expression except that expression is evaluated only one time.
expression is type ? (type)expression : (type)null
The reference for is use also states it works with reference types, however, you can also do stuff like this:
int? temp = null;
if (temp is int?)
{
// Do something
}
I'm guessing it is just an inaccuracy in the reference documentation in that the type must be nullable (ie a nullable type or a reference type) instead of just a reference type.

Apparently the MSDN documentation on the as operator needs to be updated.
object o = 7;
int i = o as **int** ?? -1;
Console.WriteLine(i);
If you try the following code where we use the as operator with the value type int, you get the appropriate compiler error message that
The as operator must be used with a reference type or nullable type ('int' is a non-nullable value type)
There is an update though on the link in Community Content section that quotes:
The as operator must be used with a reference type or nullable type.

You're applying the 'as' to Object, which is a reference type. It could be null, in which case the CLR has special support for unboxing the reference 'null' to a nullable value type. This special unboxing is not supported for any other value type, so, even though Nullable is a value type, it does have certain special privledges.

C# null - is it an object

When I was writing C# code a few days ago I noticed that the compiler complained that I had to cast null to a specific object.
Does this mean that null is simply an uninstantiated version of the type? Or is it a singleton value of a Null class like Java (even though it has special privileges)?
EDIT: an example of the code giving the error would be:
public String duplicate(String toDuplicate)
{
return toDuplicate + toDuplicate;
}
public String duplicate(int? toDuplicate)
{
String asString = toDuplicate.toString();
return asString + asString;
}
public static int Main(string[] args)
{
//This needs to be cast:
duplicate(null);
//To:
duplicate((string)null);
}
The reason I commented on null in Java was after reading this:
There is also a special null type, the
type of the expression null, which has
no name. Because the null type has no
name, it is impossible to declare a
variable of the null type or to cast
to the null type. The null reference
is the only possible value of an
expression of null type. The null
reference can always be cast to any
reference type. In practice, the
programmer can ignore the null type
and just pretend that null is merely a
special literal that can be of any
reference type.
Found here: Is null an Object?

I get the error you refer when i have overloaded methods and the compiler can't resolve which method to call at compile time. Is that it?

According to the MSDN description:
The null keyword is a literal that represents a null reference, one that does not refer to any object. null is the default value of reference-type variables. Ordinary value types cannot be null. However, C# 2.0 introduced nullable value types.

null is the "uninstanciated reference" for any type. It is not a value. null has no defined type.

No - the null is just a literal for the null reference.
The reason you need to "cast" it in this way (I put the word cast in quotes because you are not really casting an instance of anything), is purely to help the compiler resolve which overload of a method you are calling, or the method you are calling even exists.
In your example, you need to specify that you are calling the method "duplicate" that takes a single string argument. If you omit the cast, then the compiler only knows that the method you intended to call is called "duplicate" and has a single argument, but can't tell what type the argument is - did you mean to call duplicate(string) or did you mean to call duplicate(some other type)? Should it compile, or should it error telling you the method you are trying to call does not exist?
You will also get the same issue if you had a duplicate(byte[]) defined, because now your call is ambiguous without the explicit cast.

No its not an object. null is the default value of reference-type variables. Ordinary value types cannot be null. but there is another set called nullable types.

You are probably referring to the fact that the following leads to a compiler error:
int? nullableInt = (somecondition) ? value : null;
Indeed you need to add a cast here:
int? nullableInt = (somecondition) ? value : (int?)null;
Even though I'm not able to explain this in detail, I'd suspect the following:
int? is actually a short form for Nullable<int>, so it is basically an object instance. When assigning an int value to nullableInt, a property of Nullable<int> will be set internally. Directly assigning null would also be ok.
The conditional assignment however, would return two different types: int in case somecondition is true and object (null) otherwise.
Now the compiler doesn't know how to handle this, as the ternary operator needs to return values of the same type. So you need to specify the desired "type for the null value".
Sorry if this is not a very deep technical explanation - I'm sure there's somebody who can elaborate this better, but it might help understand this better.

Value of unassigned non-nullable variable (C#)

Just curious.
If you go:
string myString;
Its value is null.
But if you go:
int myInt;
What is the value of this variable in C#?
Thanks
David

Firstly, note that this is only applicable for fields, not local variables - those can't be read until they've been assigned, at least within C#. In fact the CLR initializes stack frames to 0 if you have an appropriate flag set - which I believe it is by default. It's rarely observable though - you have to go through some grotty hacks.
The default value of int is 0 - and for any type, it's essentially the value represented by a bit pattern full of zeroes. For a value type this is the equivalent of calling the parameterless constructor, and for a reference type this is null.
Basically the CLR wipes the memory clean with zeroes.
This is also the value given by default(SomeType) for any type.

default of int is 0

The default value for int is 0.
See here for the full list of default values per type: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/83fhsxwc.aspx

Here is a table of default values for value types in C#:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/83fhsxwc.aspx
Reference types default value is usually null.

String is a reference type. Int is a value type. Reference types are simply a pointer on the stack directed at the heap, which may or may not contain a value. A value type is just the value on the stack, but it must always be set to something.

The value for an unitialized variable of type T is always default(T). For all reference types this is null, and for the value types see the link that #Blorgbeard posted (or write some code to check it).