Handling nulls from database query

Hi

In VB6 you would handle null columns as follows:

VB Code:

Dim lcStrValue as string
Dim lcObjRcs as ADODB.Recordset
 
lcStrValue = "" &  lcObjRcs!Surname

I am now using VB.NET and picking up values from a DataRow object and getting an exception about DBNull.

How do I handle Null in the code below assuming the Surname column in the table is null.

VB Code:

Dim oDataRow As DataRow
 
For Each oDataRow in dtTable.Rows
    strSurname = oDataRow.Item("Surname")
Next

Thanks

I found this article on MSDN
Much ADO About Nothing
I find the handling of nulls still cumbersome though. Ideally I would prefer amethod or property on the ADO.NET object like object.ValueIfNull. The caller could set a value in this property before making the query and then whenever a column would be null the datarow would return the value set in ValueIfNull.......

You may try to use ISDBNull() method to determine if the field is null