How to get the relative path (folder the executable was launched in) as a string in C#?
Well, lets say you launch an application and you want to know the relative path.
In C# you can use the System.Reflection.Assembly.GetExecutingAssembly().Location value. I have searched through many online sites that tell different ways, and some of the more experienced C# developers say that some of the other ways are not always accurate or won’t always work, while this one should always work.
So if you make a class and add two String class variables, you can use this function to populate them: Path.GetDirectoryName(Assembly.GetExecutingAssembly().Location)
private void GetPaths() { mExecutablePath = System.Reflection.Assembly.GetExecutingAssembly().Location; mExecutableRootDirectory = System.IO.Path.GetDirectoryName(mExecutablePath); }
Ok, so I like to make sure any newbie can pull this off, so the whole file with it working (using a New WPF project):
using System; using System.Collections.Generic; using System.Text; using System.Windows; using System.Windows.Controls; using System.Windows.Data; using System.Windows.Documents; using System.Windows.Input; using System.Windows.Media; using System.Windows.Media.Imaging; using System.Windows.Navigation; using System.Windows.Shapes; namespace TestPath { /// <summary> /// Interaction logic for Window1.xaml /// </summary> public partial class Window1 : Window { DataSet mDataSet; String mExecutablePath; String mExecutableRootDirectory; public Window1() { GetPaths(); InitializeComponent(); } private void GetPaths() { mExecutablePath = System.Reflection.Assembly.GetExecutingAssembly().Location; mExecutableRootDirectory = System.IO.Path.GetDirectoryName(mExecutablePath); } } }
I am not sure this existed when I first wrote this post, but you can now do this as well:
The above options didn't work in an IIS hosted WCF service.