Something I didn't know - default property & Null

Sorry if this should be posted in a different forum; mods can move it if they want.
Lots of times you can leave off a control's default property when referring to the control, i.e. strFoo = txtBar instead of strFoo = txtBar.Text. Supposedly, this is a little faster, according to my VB5 textbook years ago.
But I didn't know until today that if, say, the textbox is empty, that method throws error 94, Invalid Use of Null. If I use txtBar.Text, it works fine, returning an empty string.
I know I could use Nz() to check the value, but it's easier to just add .Text.

Which app did you experience this with?

Sorry, Access 2K.
Maybe using the default property makes Access treat the property as a variant, rather than text or a string?

Or could it be that your setting a field = to the textbox? Is the textbox a bould control?

Nope. Unbound controls. The type of code that throws the error is strAns2 = txtAns2, if txtAns2 is empty. txtAns2.Text works, empty or not.
Maybe it's me. I get weird stuff sometimes, like a project called "utility" that once in a while appears as a 2nd project in the Project Explorer window. That has two forms, autodial and zoomform, & 4 modules, none of which are viewable. next time, the project may have disappeared.

Nope, it is a recreatable error. I did this and I got error 94. I guess there is no default property if the textbox
doesnt have the focus. If it has focus then the text property should return a nullstring instead of a Null.

VB Code:

Dim str As String
    'str = Forms![Form1]![txtTextBox]
    str = Null '<same error as the line above
    MsgBox str

It happens even when the focus is set to the textbox. If it's empty, and no .Text, error 94 pops up. It's not a bug, it's an undocumented feature...

Yes, a undocumented feature. :D

But if you try to do this you obviously understand the error - "str = Null" - Invalid use of Null.
So if the textbox is empty and you dont include the property then consider it as a Null. :D