Question

No matter how I flip this script around it still gives me Object reference not set to an instance of an object. message when I debug (The program runs fine if I don’t debug, but every time I debug I get this message, why is that?)

public string GetTemplate(int pageId)
{
    string template = "";

    PagesIndex qq = new PagesIndex();
    qq = (from cc in db.PagesIndexes where cc.Id == pageId select cc).SingleOrDefault();

    if (qq.Template == null) //Here on  qq.Template - Object reference not set to an instance of an object.
    {
        template = "_Layout";
    }
    else
    {
        template = qq.Template;
    }
    return template;
}

Hope you can change my mood 🙂

Answer 1

Probably qq resulting from LINQ is null.
Try this

public string GetTemplate(int pageId)
{
    string template = "";
    PagesIndex qq = new PagesIndex();
    qq = (from cc in db.PagesIndexes where cc.Id == pageId select cc).SingleOrDefault();

    if (qq == null || qq.Template == null)
        template = "_Layout";
    }
    else
    {
        template = qq.Template;
    }
    return template;
}

or shortly:

public string GetTemplate(int pageId)
{
    PagesIndex qq = db.PagesIndexes
                      .Where(p => p.Id == pageId)
                      .SingleOrDefault();
    return qq == null || qq.Template == null ?
           "_Layout" :
           qq.Template;
}