Fluent assertion to verify DateTime field is not empty

Question

var dte = "2021-12-18T15:06:33.2677927Z"
dte.Should(). 

I want to check that this dte is not empty.

Currently I am using :

dte.Should().BeAfter(new DateTime());

Answer 1

From the example, your definition of an "empty" DateTime seems to be one different from the default value.

If you're looking for a more readable/idiomatic way to express that, I would go with

DateTime subject = MethodUnderTest();
subject.Should().NotBe(default);

For the general case, one cannot speak of an "empty" DateTime since even the default value is just the minimum representable valid datetime, namely 0001-01-01T00:00:00.

So all of these are identical.

• DateTime.Parse("0001-01-01T00:00:00")
• default(DateTime)
• new DateTime()
• DateTime.MinValue
• DateTime.FromBinary(0)