Is there anything unique for file and folder in windows c#?

Question

Hi I am working on files n folder using C#....May I know is there any way to get the UID for file-folders....Till now i was using the full path of the file....But my problem in is renaming of files n folder...which will change the UID for file folder.. Plz is ther any way to do the same thanks in advance

Answer 1

Sorry, there's nothing you can reliably trace that's retained after a file/folder is moved or renamed. Your only real option is to keep track of the renames or simply tell the user that the file's not there anymore.

Answer 2

First, I think you can get clearer responses if you more clearly define what you mean by "working on files."

No, there's nothing like a "UID" for file or directories. But if you wish to dynamically monitor the state of files and directories, and have events raised notifying you when they are moved/changed/deleted, etc. You can use .NET's FileSystemWatcher class.

Using that technique you could start off, for example, with a Dictionary whose key might be some UID or GUID, or whatever, of the form Dictionary<UID,string>, where string might be the original filename. You could then, as you receive events from the FileSystemWatcher, update a second Dictionary<UID,string> where its string might be the changed file path :

I'm not really proposing you specifically use Dictionaries here, but just using them as possible examples of data structures you could create to keep track of certain files by original name/location and by (possibly) changed name/location ... or if they are deleted, copied, etc.

Answer 3

Hey.. there is a sample provided by microsoft.. it is installed in

"Windows Mobile 6 SDK\Samples\PocketPC\CPP\win32\FileChangeNotif"

location of your hard drive..

through filechangenotif smaple you will get the information about file change notification like Renaming file,Deletion, addition...hope this can help you