c# - Checking for null before ToString()

Question

Here's the scenario...

if (entry.Properties["something"].Value != null)
  attribs.something = entry.Properties["something"].Value.ToString();

While effective and working correctly, this looks ugly to me. If I don't check for a null before performing the ToString() then it throws an exception if the property was null. Is there a better way to handle this scenario?

Much appreciated!

Answer 1

Update 8 years later (wow!) to cover c# 6's null-conditional operator:

var value = maybeNull?.ToString() ?? String.Empty;

Other approaches:

object defaultValue = "default";
attribs.something = (entry.Properties["something"].Value ?? defaultValue).ToString()

I've also used this, which isn't terribly clever but convenient:

public static string ToSafeString(this object obj)
{
    return (obj ?? string.Empty).ToString();
}