Do you have to dispose of the SPWeb in the EventReceiver when using properties.OpenWeb()?

Question

Does properties.OpenWeb() create a new SPRequest object or does it refer to the existing SPWeb object already there in the properties object? Should we manually dispose of the SPWeb obtained in this manner?

Is the second line safer?

        SPWeb _web = properties.OpenWeb();
        SPWeb _web = properties.ListItem.ParentList.ParentWeb;

Answer 1

In SharePoint 2007 you need to dispose the returned SPWeb if you use properties.OpenWeb()

In SP2010 you should use the SPItemEventProperties.Web property instead. This performs better than OpenWeb and has no dispose issues.

hth Anders Rask

Answer 2

Should nobody prove me wrong, I shall presume (until I resort to ILDASM / Reflector) that the safe way in ItemEventReceivers would be to use

SPWeb _web = properties.ListItem.ParentList.ParentWeb;

Surely,

if (properties.ListItem != null) SPWeb _web = properties.ListItem.ParentList.ParentWeb;

or

bool _shouldDispose = false;
try {_web = properties.ListItem.ParentList.ParentWeb;} catch (SPException ex) {_web = properties.OpenWeb(); _shouldDispose=true;}