VB.NET Byte Problem

Question

I am porting some c# code to vb.net, currently trying to figure out how to do this..

byte isEndReached = //get some data

if (isEndReached != 0)
{
   for (int y = 0; y < isEndReached ; y++)
   {
     //do some stuff
   }

}

My attempt:

 Dim isEndReached As Byte = ''//getsomedata
 If Not isEndReached Is Nothing Then 
 For y As Byte = 0 To isEndReached - 1
     ''//do some stuff
 Next
 End If

Problem is I am getting the following error:

'Is' operator does not accept operands of type 'Byte'. Operands must be reference or nullable types.

How am I supposed to fix this?

Thanks!

Answer 1

You can't use Is with value types. Likewise, Nothing has a different meaning for value types than for reference types. You can just write it like this:

If isEndReached <> 0 Then

or like this:

If isEndReached <> Nothing Then

and looking at your code, I'd actually write it like this in case the function somehow returns a negative value for the byte:

If isEndReached > 0 Then

or alternatively declare your byte on the previous line and then just loop while it's less than isEndReached:

Dim y As Byte
While y < isEndReached
    ''...
    y += 1
End While

Your For doesn't have the exact same meaning as the C# code either, but it should actually be a better match- you're comparing bytes to bytes rather than ints to bytes.