Question

Stack Overflowers:

I have been racking my brain trying to get an List(of T) type array to be the property of a class. I know there has to be a simple way of doing it and I can’t find a good example on google. Everytime I create a class that I think will work I get the “Object reference not set to an instance of an object” error when I try to use it. My thinking now is that I cannot use it in the way I was hoping to. Here is my latest attempt:

Public Class Item
    Private _itemno As String
    Public Property ItemNo() As String
        Get
            Return _itemno
        End Get
        Set(ByVal value As String)
            _itemno = value
        End Set
    End Property
        //Many more properties in here
End Class


Public Class Accessory
    Private _items as List(of Item)
    Public Property Items() As List(of Item)
        Get
            Return _itemno
        End Get
        Set(ByVal value As List(of Item))
            _itemno = value
        End Set
    End Property
End Class

Public Class MasterItem
    Private _item as Item
    Public Property PrimaryItem as Item
        Get
            Return _item
        End Get
        Set(ByVal value As Item)
            _item = value
        End Set
    End Property

    Private _accessories as Accessory
    Public Property Accessories() As Accessory
        Get
            Return _accessories
        End Get
        Set(ByVal value As Accessory)
            _accessories = value
        End Set
    End Property
End Class

I am trying to return the MasterItem class from a test function like this:

Public Shared Function GetItem() as MasterItem
    Dim testItem as new MasterItem

    ReturnItem.PrimaryItem.ItemNo = "TEST123"

    ReturnItem.Accessories.Items.add(New Item("TESTACC1"))
    ReturnItem.Accessories.Items.add(New Item("TESTACC2"))

    Return testItem
End Function

What am I doing wrong here? Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

You haven’t create an instance of list you are trying to put items to.

Initialize it in constructor of your Accessory class. Something like

Public Sub New()
    _items = New List(Of Item)
End Sub