& Operator (Visual Basic)
Generates a string concatenation of two expressions.
Syntax
result = expression1 & expression2
Parts
result
Required. Any String
or Object
variable.
expression1
Required. Any expression with a data type that widens to String
.
expression2
Required. Any expression with a data type that widens to String
.
Remarks
If the data type of expression1
or expression2
is not String
but widens to String
, it is converted to String
. If either of the data types does not widen to String
, the compiler generates an error.
The data type of result
is String
. If one or both expressions evaluate to Nothing or have a value of DBNull.Value, they are treated as a string with a value of "".
Note
The &
operator can be overloaded, which means that a class or structure can redefine its behavior when an operand has the type of that class or structure. If your code uses this operator on such a class or structure, be sure you understand its redefined behavior. For more information, see Operator Procedures.
Note
The ampersand (&) character can also be used to identify variables as type Long
. For more information, see Type Characters.
Example
This example uses the &
operator to force string concatenation. The result is a string value representing the concatenation of the two string operands.
Dim sampleStr As String
sampleStr = "Hello" & " World"
' The preceding statement sets sampleStr to "Hello World".