My exact file path is as follows. This .txt file is not supposed to be deployed to bin/debug
string str = File.ReadAllText(#"C:\development\slnfolder\projfolder\myfile.txt");
How can I write the code so that I do not have to hard code full path to get to the file
I am trying to avoid hard coding path in the above line of code as follows:
string file = #"myfile.txt";
string str = Path.GetFullPath(file);
but the str ends up being as follows and is not able to find the file.
C:\development\slnfolder\projfolder\bin\debug\myfile.txt
You can include myfile.txt in your Visual Studio solution and go to its properties and set the Build action to Copy always (or Copy if newer if you want to avoid copying the file if it didn't change since the previous build...).
This way you're going to have the whole file in the target directory (i.e. bin\debug).
That's where it should map, because that's where your executable is running from. I'd highly suggest you ensure that the text file is moved to the bin/debug folder (there's a VS option to copy it down in properties) rather than trying to read two levels up. It will be much easier once you end up deploying your app instead of running it from visual studio.
If you're using Visual studio, than add the txt file to your project
right click on properties
set build action to none
and set copy to output directory to copy if newer
this will ensure that the txt file is always in the same folder as your executable
To avoid hard-coding something, you should:
"Soft-code" it (i.e. make it part of your product's configuration). You can use Configuration Settings APIs for that.
Take it as a parameter on the command line (read the directory location from one of the args passed to the Main method), or
Make a convention as to where it should be located, for example, in the data directory, which is a subdirectory of your current running directory (read from #"..\data\myfile.txt").
You can always define a combination of these methods, for example, use the "by convention" location when the configuration / command line option has not been specified.
Related
I have a WPF desktop application. When I am in debug mode, I am able to access file.sql and read the contents.When I publish the file using visual studio and try to run the click once application,I am unable to read the file.sql file and the app cannot find the path. The .cs file where I am calling to read file.sql is located in the same folder.
string path = System.IO.Path.Combine(AppDomain.CurrentDomain.BaseDirectory,#"..\..\ControlFolder","file.sql");
string readQuery = File.ReadAllText(path);
How can I ensure that I am able to read file.sql after publishing my app?
When you publish, you need to ensure that you are also publishing your "file.sql" to the binary output path. The best practice is to avoid using relative paths to your source code, and instead you should always make sure that you point to files that you (the developer) will ensure exists in the published area.
Here's what I would do:
In Visual Studio, go to the properties of "file.sql" and make sure it is set to "Content" and "Copy if newer". This will make sure that your "file.sql" will always exist in the binary output path. If in Visual Studio, you have placed "file.sql" inside of a folder called "ControlFolder", then that means your binary output contents will contain a ".\ControlFolder\file.sql" file.
Fix your code to never point to the relative path of your source code. Instead, rely on the binary output path. So instead of the code that you shared, replace it with this:
string path = System.IO.Path.Combine(System.IO.Path.GetDirectoryName(Assembly.GetEntryAssembly().Location), #"ControlFolder\file.sql");
string readQuery = File.ReadAllText(path);
I want to acess a .txt file, which I stored in the resources folder of my project, there where all the imported pictures are stored as well.
I want to use something like a relative path, since every user would have safed his programm somewehere else on his Pc, but there is always the resources folder at the same place, compared to the programm folder.
I tried to used this: displayText = System.IO.File.ReadAllText("Resources\\startmessages.txt"); but this isn't working.
I get this error message: System.IO.DirectoryNotFoundException:, it lists the unrelative path to the .txt there as well, so I don't get, why it cant read it.
Thanks for your Help.
What #ChetanRanpariya is trying to tell you is, that your programm is built in another folder than your folder Resources is sitting to. So you have explictly tell your file Resources\startmessages.txt to copy itself on build process, so it get copied to said another folder. Assuming that you are using Visual Studio, you have to right click on your file and set Copy To Output Directory to true. Its relative folder path (Resources\) will be taken over. You find your build folder somewhere in your bin folder depending on configuration and framework. :)
Current Path where your executable is
Directory.GetParent(System.IO.Directory.GetCurrentDirectory()).FullName
Path to Solution
If you are using Visual Studio and need to access the folders in the solution directory, you can use .Parent method,
Directory.GetParent(System.IO.Directory.GetCurrentDirectory()).Parent.Parent.FullName
Use of Path.Combine
and once you have the location of your Resource folder, use Path.Combine to get the location to read files / content etc
Path.Combine(Directory.GetParent(System.IO.Directory.GetCurrentDirectory()).Parent.Parent.FullName, "Resources\\startMessages.txt")
I am loading this file which is located in a folder i created, the same folder is also rendered in the bin/debug folder, but i need to locate the file in the folder i created, the thing is the method which should find the path of the file by its name gives me the path of the debug folder instead of the on i created.
I have harcoded the path to show you the real location.
var path2 = System.IO.Path.Combine(Environment.CurrentDirectory, "xulrunner");
var hardcodedPath= "C:\\Users\\Alan\\Desktop\\TabControl\\TabControl\\TabControl\\TabControl\\xulrunner";
This is the result of path2 variable:
C:\\Users\\Alan\\Desktop\\TabControl\\TabControl\\TabControl\\TabControl\\bin\\Debug\\xulrunner"
As you can see its pointing to different folder as hardcoded path.
When running from Visual Studio, the working directory is different from your project location, usually it is two folders up (from bin\Debug\). In your distributed application, the working directory might be the same as that of other files you want to access since you copy some other files to the working directory.
I would recommend to keep your code the same, and copy the files you require from your project to the output directory. You can do that by simply setting the Copy to Output Directory setting to Copy always or Copy if newer.
Changing the path to go two folders up is a bad idea, since this won't be true in production scenarios, and will thus break your code.
To get exactly what you are looking for, you could do the following:
var path2 = System.IO.Path.GetFullPath(System.IO.Path.Combine(Environment.CurrentDirectory, "..\\..\\xulrunner"));
However, please be aware that Environment.CurrentDirectory can change as your program runs. I have found that using the %PROGRAMDATA% environment variable works well for creating a location where you save data. It allows for a more consistent solution for using paths.
Additionally, the code snippet provided will only really be useful when you are running through the IDE's debugger. When you deploy, it will likely not give you what you are expecting.
It would help to know what is the overall functional result you are hoping for.
I need to read data from a file in a c# console application.
What works: new StreamReader(#"..\\..\myData.csv");
Problem:
the ..\\..\ work because my exe file is in the bin/Debug directory
When I deploy my project the path doesn't work any longer
Question:
How can I reference myData.csv regardless of the location of the exe file?
I had hoped to find a method that returns the 'root' of my console application
So far I tried the following:
Process.GetCurrentProcess().MainModule.FileName
Path.GetDirectoryName(Assembly.GetEntryAssembly().Location
Path.GetFullPath("bp.csv")
AppDomain.CurrentDomain.BaseDirectory
Directory.GetCurrentDirectory()
All of these expressions lead me to the directory of the exe file not the root.
I just started to read about isolated storage but it would be nice to have something simpler. Any suggestions / recommendations?
The simplest option is probably to add your CSV file to the solution and right-click it in VS and set the build action to "Copy if newer", which will output it together with the .exe (to the Debug or Release folder) when you build.
In the code, you can get the current location of the executing assembly like this:
string folder = Path.GetDirectoryName(Assembly.GetExecutingAssembly().Location);
And then you can combine the path with the CSV file name:
string filePath = Path.Combine(folder, "myData.csv");
Where your myData.csv will be stored ? You should have an absolute location of this file.
there are couple of options
You can place this file at the same directory where your exe is placed so you will only need to do
new StreamReader("myData.csv");
you can define file location in the App.Conig file and read that location.
you can set a path variable an read the PATH variable.
You should change your code to
new StreamReader("myData.csv");
This will ensure that the data is always read from the same folder the .exe is run from.
After that, you can create a post build step to copy the file to the deployment folder (or a subfolder) so that even in your debug environment the file will be in the correct place. The property "Copy to Output Folder" on the data file will do this as well if you just need the file to be in the output path for a project.
If you need more control, n the post build steps you can use macros like $(ProjectPath) to reference where the project files are located and $(TargetDir) to reference where the output directory will be.
I am developing an application in C#. I have a folder called myfolder it contains a file called mypoints.bmp. The folder myfolder is in my project folder it is in D drive. The path is D:\Myproject\myfolder\mypoints.bmp.
Now, in my program, whereever I need mypoints.bmp I have hardcoded the whole path. When my project is copied in to a different system under C drive, I am not able to run my project because of the hardcoded path. How can I give the path so that there will not be any problem even if it is loaded in to a different system under a different drive.
The best would be to store the path in a configuration file.
Add -> New Item -> Application Configuration File
Then you can use the following class to pull the value you're looking for:
System.Configuration.ConfigurationManager
Have a look here on the usage.
If the images you are referring to are non-changing and are simply acting as a resource for your application then you could consider embedding them in resource files which are compiled as part of your assembly. That way you need never worry about paths or copying them.
If the BMP file is used in the code and is accessed in runtime, there is no point in keeping it just in the project directory. it should be also present in the outputdirectory.
i.e you could write a post-build command to copy your folder to the output directory.
like copy "$(ProjectDir)\MyFolder\*.*" "$(OutDir)"
then in the code you could just write the relative path i.e "MyFolder\MyPoints.bmp"
But please remember one thing. If this BMP file is not going to change through out your program execution, it is better that you put it as a resource.
You can use something like GetCurrentPath(), which will return your .exe file path, then add to this path your \myfolder\mypoints.bmp. This will not be depend on C or D or ... drive and folder
There is one path that you can always reliably find, no matter how your program got deployed to the target machine: the directory in which your .exe is stored.
Take advantage of this, put the .bmp file in the same directory. Or a subdirectory of the install directory. You didn't say what kind of program you wrote, it is easy with Application.ExecutablePath in Windows Forms. But the generic solution that works everywhere:
public static string GetImagePath(string filename) {
string exeFile = System.Reflection.Assembly.GetEntryAssembly().Location;
string exePath = System.IO.Path.GetDirectoryName(exeFile);
string imgPath = System.IO.Path.Combine(exePath, #"images");
string imgFile = System.IO.Path.Combine(imgPath, filename);
return imgFile;
}
Which assumes the images are stored in a subdirectory named "images". Tweak as necessary.
Last but not least: don't forget that you can add images to your program's resources so it is baked in the .exe file. Project + Properties, Resources tab. Highly recommended.
You can also use predefined or existed system variable. Anyway you must decide when the user (or you) have to define that path (in config file or wherever) - during instalaltion, first run, before first run or in any time when app is running.
Personally I would use the Environment class in C#. Then I will locate the local app settings folder using the Environment.SpecialFolder enum.
I will then store all my applications specific files inside a folder in the local app settings folder.
This way you are also UAC safe, since UAC will complain if you want to store files in Program Files if you are not Administrator.