Saving empty string using Entity Framework , saves string with white-spaces?

Question

I have a column in a table that is :

QuestionDescription nchar(150)

The name of the table is Questions. When I put in the entity Questions an empty string, meaning:

Questions questionObj = new Questions();
questionObj.QuestionDescription = string.Empty();

Entity Framework saves a string of 150 whitespaces in the database.

Why?

I tried to put an empty string, but it always puts 150 whitespaces.

Any idea why?

Thanks

It's not Entity Framework that's to blame - this is SQL Server that's causing the storing of "whitespace" (since you're basically using the wrong datatype). The same effect would be observable if you used straight raw ADO.NET - this has nothing to do with EF .... — marc_s
– marc_s, Commented Apr 12, 2015 at 13:33
Note: White space characters is a category of characters, including spaces, tabs and line breaks. What you are talking about is the space character. — Guffa
– Guffa, Commented Apr 12, 2015 at 13:38

juharr · Accepted Answer · 2015-04-12 13:16:12Z

5

That's because the type is nchar instead of nvarchar. With nchar it will always be a value with the exact number of characters you specify, so it will be space filled by the DB, not EF. If you want an actually empty string in your DB then you should use nvarchar instead which will save string values up to the size you give, without padding them to the given size.

answered Apr 12, 2015 at 13:16

juharr

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Jonesopolis · Accepted Answer · 2015-04-12 13:13:37Z

4

This is a problem with your database. nchar is fixed length. Try nvarchar data type instead

answered Apr 12, 2015 at 13:13

Jonesopolis

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MRebai · Accepted Answer · 2015-04-12 13:21:48Z

1

I suggest u to use nvarchar data type instead nchar is fixed length, nvarchar is a varying length. Typically I would recommend you use nvarchar all the time, unless you have a short (< 5 char) field and you are 100% sure it is a set size.

The "n" at the beginning signifies a double byte character to store Unicode data. Use that if you need to handle multiple languages, or languages with double byte characters like Chinese.

answered Apr 12, 2015 at 13:21

MRebai

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