>VFP has EMPTY() function for that.

In general, EMPTY() will work, but I'm a bit on the paranoid side, and EMPTY() will work on zeros, .F. values and so forth. If I want an blank character string, I'd rather test with something specific to characters, so the code will generate an error if it fails to be character.

Then again, I'd also prefer that VFP had strongly typed variables, but that's my C background speaking again. :)