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Read text file from relative path within project

I am creating a unit test which works using the following exact path:
string path = #"/Users/{username}/Coding/computershare/ChallengeSampleDataSet1.txt";
I read the text from the file by passing this path
string pricesFromFile = System.IO.File.ReadAllText(path);
However, I do not want to hardcode the complete local file path - I want to use the relative path in the project directory.
Therefore I tried the below using other articles on StackOverflow:
string path = System.IO.Path.Combine(System.AppDomain.CurrentDomain.BaseDirectory, "ChallengeSampleDataSet1.txt");
But file is not found. How can I fix this so that I'm able to load the file when running the app from another machine?
Edit: the error in console using the second method is
System.IO.FileNotFoundException : Could not find file '/Users/{username}/Coding/computershare/bin/Debug/net5.0/ChallengeSampleDataSet1.txt'.

This should do the trick:
string path = System.IO.Path.Combine(System.AppDomain.CurrentDomain.BaseDirectory + #"..\..\..\", "ChallengeSampleDataSet1.txt");
Note the direction of the slash (\)
Since the error is "/Users/{username}/Coding/computershare/bin/Debug/net5.0/ChallengeSampleDataSet1.txt" it indicates that your base directory is /bin/debug/net5.0 down from the root of the code. By double dotting up three levels, you'll be able to find the file in question.

Copy file using relative path

File.Copy(#"my program\\subfolder\\what i want to copy.txt", "C:\\Targetlocation");
How can i copy a text file from one folder to another using relative path.

To execute the File.Copy the source and destination will be a valid file path. in your case the destination is a folder not File. in this case you may get some exception like
Could not find a part of the path 'F:\New folder'
While executing the application, the current directory will be the bin folder. you need to specify the relative path from there. Let my program/subfolder be the folders in your solution, so the code for this will be like this:
string sourcePath = "../../my program/subfolder/what i want to copy.txt";
string destinationPath = #"C:\Targetlocation\copyFile.txt"
File.Copy(sourcePath, destinationPath );
Where ../ will help you to move one step back from the current directory. One more thing you have to care is the third optional parameter in the File.Copy method. By passing true for this parameter will help you to overwrite the contents of the existing file.Also make sure that the folder C:\Targetlocation is existing, as this will not create the folder for you.

File.Copy(#"subfolder\\what i want to copy.txt", "C:\\Targetlocation\\TargetFilePath.txt");
The sourceFileName and destFileName parameters can specify relative or
absolute path information. Relative path information is interpreted as
relative to the current working directory. This method does not
support wildcard characters in the parameters.
File.Copy on MSDN
Make sure your target directory exists. You can use Directory.CreateDirectory
Directory.CreateDirectory("C:\\Targetlocation");
With Directory.CreateDirectory(), you don't have to check if the directory exists. From documentation:
Any and all directories specified in path are created, unless they
already exist or unless some part of path is invalid. The path
parameter specifies a directory path, not a file path. If the
directory already exists, this method does nothing.

// Remove path from the file name.
string fName = f.Substring(sourceDir.Length + 1);
try
{
// Will not overwrite if the destination file already exists.
File.Copy(Path.Combine(sourceDir, fName), Path.Combine(backupDir, fName));
}

You can provide the relative path from your current working directory which can be checked via Environment.CurrentDirectoy.
For example if your current working directory is D:\App, your source file location is D:\App\Res\Source.txt and your target location is D:\App\Res\Test\target.txt then your code snippet will be -
File.Copy(Res\\Source.txt, Res\\Test\\target.txt);

Converting absolute path to relative path C# [duplicate]

This question already has answers here:
Closed 10 years ago.
Possible Duplicate:
Getting path relative to the current working directory?
I have code in C# that includes some images from an absolute path to a relative so the image can be found no matter where the application fold is located.
For example the path in my code (and in my laptop for the image) is
C:/something/res/images/image1.jpeg
and I want the path in my code to be
..../images/image1.jpeg
So it can run wherever the folder is put, whatever the name of the C: partition is etc.
I want to have a path in my code which is independant of the application folder location or if it is in another partition, as long as it is in the same folder as the the rest of the solution.
I have this code:
try
{
File.Delete("C:/JPD/SCRAT/Desktop/Project/Resources/images/image1.jpeg");
}
catch (Exception)
{
MessageBox.Show("File not found:C:/Users/JPD/Desktop/Project/images/image1.jpeg");
}
This code only runs if the file and folder are in that certain path, (which is also the location of the code) I wish for that path to be relative so wherever I put the whole folder (code, files etc) the program will still work as long as the code (which is under project folder) is at the same location with the folder images... what should I do?

Relative paths are based from the binary file from which your application is running. By default, your binary files will be outputted in the [directory of your .csproj]/bin/debug. So let's say you wanted to create your images folder at the same level as your .csproj. Then you could access your images using the relative path "../../images/someImage.jpg".
To get a better feel for this, try out the following as a test:
1) create a new visual studio sample project,
2) create an images folder at the same level as the .csproj
3) put some files in the images folder
4) put this sample code in your main method -
static void Main(string[] args)
{
Console.WriteLine(Directory.GetCurrentDirectory());
foreach (string s in Directory.EnumerateFiles("../../images/"))
{
Console.WriteLine(s);
}
Console.ReadLine(); // Just to keep the console from disappearing.
}
You should see the relative paths of all the files you placed in step (3).

see: Getting path relative to the current working directory?
Uri uri1 = new Uri(#"c:\foo\bar\blop\blap");
Uri uri2 = new Uri(#"c:\foo\bar\");
string relativePath = uri2.MakeRelativeUri(uri1).ToString();

Depending on the set up of your program, you might be able to simply use a relative path by skipping a part of the full path string. It's not braggable, so J. Skit might be up my shiny for it but I'm getting the impression that you simply want to make it work. Beauty being a later concern.
String absolutePath = #"c:\beep\boop\HereWeStart\hopp.gif";
String relativePath = absolutePath.Substring(13);
You could then, if you need/wish, exchange the number 13 (which is an ugly and undesirable approach, still working, though) for a dynamically computed one. For instance (assuming that the directory "HereWeStart", where your relative path is starting, is the first occurrence of that string in absolutePath) you could go as follows.
String absolutePath = #"c:\beep\boop\HereWeStart\hopp.gif";
int relativePathStartIndex = absolutePath.IndexOf("HereWeStart");
String relativePath = absolutePath.Substring(relativePathStartIndex);
Also, your question begs an other question. I'd like to know how you're obtaining the absolute path. Perhaps there's an even more clever way to avoid the hustle all together?
EDIT
You could also try the following approach. Forget the Directory class giving you an absolute path. Go for the relative path straight off. I'm assuming that all the files you're attempting to remove are in the same directory. If not, you'll need to add some more lines but we'll cross that bridge when we get there.
Don't forget to mark an answer as green-checked (or explain what's missing or improvable still).
String
deletableTarget = #"\images\image1.jpeg",
hereWeAre = Environment.CurrentDirectory;
MessageBox.Show("The taget path is:\n" + hereWeAre + deletableTarget);
try
{ File.Delete(hereWeAre + deletableTarget); }
catch (Exception exception)
{ MessageBox.Show(exception.Message); }
Also, please note that I took the liberty of changing your exception handling. While yours is working, it's a better style to rely on the built-in messaging system. That way you'll get more professionally looking error messages. Not that we ever get any errors at run-time, right? ;)

How to get image files in c# using relative path?

I've checked this thread How to get files in a relative path in C#, the directory is in IDE, which is not correct for me. I have a website application, needs to get image files from the same level folder img. I can use following code to get them:
DirectoryInfo path=new DirectoryInfo(#"c:\WebsiteSolution\wwwroot\Chat\img");
FileInfo[] images = path.GetFiles("*");
But I want to use something like .\img to replace the parameter in the first line code, is that possible?

Call the Server.MapPath utility to get the relative path.
DirectoryInfo path = Server.MapPath("~\Chat\img");

For ASP.Net use MapPath - http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.web.httpserverutility.mappath.aspx.
Also if you just need to construct path for rendering a page just /Chat/img/My.gif is enough.

You need to find an anchor - something like Application.ExecutablePath - and then use that anchor with Path.Combine() to reach your image directory.
If your Application.ExecutablePath were: #"c:\WebSiteSolution\wwwroot\chat\code", then you could use string imgPath = Path.Combine(Application.ExecutablePath, #"..\img");
If you have a hard time finding a good anchor, there's a bunch to consider. You can get the path of the executing assembly via Assembly.GetExecutingAssembly().Location

Getting the physical path

I have to fetch all the files from a folder and i am using the function GetFiles() like
string[] dirImages = Directory.GetFiles(strPathYearImages + intYear , "*.png");
where strPathYearImages="Images\Holiday\2010\"
but when i write the whole path like
string[] dirImages = Directory.GetFiles(#"E:\IWP\Images\Holiday\"+ intYear , "*.png");
i get the required result.
How to solve this problem? I dont want to use the whole path.
Help me out.
Regards,
Jigar <3

The documentation for GetFiles() says:
The path parameter is permitted to
specify relative or absolute path
information. Relative path information
is interpreted as relative to the
current working directory
So you would want to make sure the current working directory is set correctly before trying to use the relative paths (eg to E:\IWP):
GetCurrentDirectory
SetCurrentDirectory

Use Application.StartupPath to get the location where the executable is running. From there you need to know where the images directory is relative to that directory. The only other option is the absolute path. How else would it know where to look?
You can also try using System.IO.Path methods to help - especially for combining path strings, plus it also gives you the location of special folders like My Documents, AppData, and the desktop.

Maybe it's because you are running it from VS inside. Your executable is in ProjectName\bin\Debug, therefore it looks for ProjectName\bin\Debug\Images, which obviously does not exists.

The problem is the first snippet tries to get the images under current path. So you could tell the images path relative to your current path.

Hey all, i got the answer to my question.
I just had to write
string[] dirImages = HttpContext.Current.Server.MapPath(strPathImages + intYear , "*.png");
Hope that it is helpful to all...