C# 0 The Complete Reference

PART II

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A string literal automatically creates a string object. For this reason, a 

string

 object is 

often initialized by assigning it a string literal, as shown here:

string str = "a new string";

String_Field,_Indexer,_and_Property'>The String Field, Indexer, and Property

The

String

 class defines one field, shown here:

public static readonly string Empty

Empty

 specifies an empty string, which is a string that contains no characters. This differs 

from a null 

String

 reference, which simply refers to no object.

There is one read-only indexer defined for 

String

, which is shown here:

public char this[int idx] { get; }

This indexer allows you to obtain the character at a specified index. Like arrays, the 

indexing for strings begins at zero. Since 

String

 objects are immutable, it makes sense that 

String

 supports a read-only indexer.

There is one read-only property:

public int Length { get; }

Length

 returns the number of characters in the string.