title: How to change the behavior of string objects in web service calls via Windows Communication Foundation?
body: <p>I have third party api's which require string values to be submitted as empty strings.
  On an asp.net page I can use this code (abbreviated here) and it works fine:</p>
  
  <pre><code>public class Customer
  {
      private string addr1 = "";
      public string Addr1
      {
          get {return addr1;}
          set {addr1 = value;}
      }
  
      private string addr2 = "";
      public string Addr2
      {
          get {return addr2;}
          set {addr2 = value;}
      }
  
      private string city = "";
      public string City
      {
          get {return city;}
          set {city = value;}
  
      }
  }
  
  Customer cust = new Customer();
  cust.Addr1 = "1 Main St.";
  cust.City = "Hartford";
  int custno = CustomerController.InsertCustomer(cust);
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>The Addr2 field, which was not initialized is still an empty string when inserted.</p>
  
  <p>However, using the same code but called it through a web service based on Windows Communication Foundation the Addr2 field is null.  Is there a way (or setting) where all string fields, even if uninitialized, would return an empty string (unless, of course, a value was set). </p>