Why is there no here document syntax in .Net?

Question

• Is it considered bad form? Maybe it promotes non-separate model / view?
• Is it inefficient?
• Was it just left out?

I guess every language has features that certain developers wish were there, and not every language can have everything. I've just always found this feature to be pretty handy. Why does .Net not have a here document syntax?

Answer 1

I'm assuming that by ".NET" you really mean "C#".

C# does have verbatim string literals, allowing multi-line input preserving formatting, with only a single escape concern (double-quote). If you mean "with variable interpolation" - the Mono folks have played with that - see here - but it is not a language feature of the formal c# specification.

You could also argue that razor (and other view-template engines) is (/are) exactly this, using @x etc to signify a variable, or @(expr) for more complex examples.

Answer 2

It does. But the syntax is a little different.

Instead of << the opening delimiter is @".

You don't need to preface each line with any delimiter. That makes it simpler to type.

There is no way to change the ending delimiter. It is always ";

For example...

var foo = @"
        Lol
    this is me
         laughing out loud
";