diff --git a/bundles/org.eclipse.wst.xml.ui/src/org/eclipse/wst/xml/ui/internal/validation/DelegatingSourceValidator.java b/bundles/org.eclipse.wst.xml.ui/src/org/eclipse/wst/xml/ui/internal/validation/DelegatingSourceValidator.java
index eddc9e5..117ca1b 100644
--- a/bundles/org.eclipse.wst.xml.ui/src/org/eclipse/wst/xml/ui/internal/validation/DelegatingSourceValidator.java
+++ b/bundles/org.eclipse.wst.xml.ui/src/org/eclipse/wst/xml/ui/internal/validation/DelegatingSourceValidator.java
@@ -125,7 +125,7 @@
 			// store the text in a byte array; make a full copy to ease
 			// any threading problems
 			ByteArrayOutputStream outputStream = new ByteArrayOutputStream();
-			byte[] byteArray = null;
+			byte[] byteArray = new byte[0];
 			try {
 				int docLength = fDocument.getLength();
 				/*