Is there a more correct type for passing in the file path and file name to a method

Question

Hi

What I mean by this question is, when you need to store or pass a URL around, using a string is probably a bad practice, and a better approach would be to use a URI type. However it is so easy to make complex things more complex and bloated.

So if I am going to be writing to a file on disk, do I pass it a string, as the file name and file path, or is there a better type that will be better suited to the requirement?

This code seems to be clunky, and error prone? I would also need to do a whole bit of checking if it is a valid file name, if the string contains data and the list goes on.

private void SaveFile(string fileNameAndPath) { //The normal stuff to save the file }

Answer 1

Unfortunate as it is, string is the idiomatic way of doing this in .NET - if you look at things like FileStream constructors etc, they use strings.

You could consider using FileInfo (or DirectoryInfo) but that would be somewhat unusual.

Answer 2

You could use FileInfo (from System.IO) to pass it around, but strings are more or less standard when referring to files.

You could always use Path.GetFileName({yourstring}) to get the filename from the path.

Answer 3

A string is fine for the filename. The .Net Framework uses strings for filenames, that seems fine.

To validate the filename you could try and use a regular expression or check for invalid characters against System.IO.Path.GetInvalidFileNameChars. However, it is probably easier to handle the exceptional cases of invalid filenames by handling the exception that will occur when you try and create the file - plus you need to do this anyway....

Answer 4

String is fine, but you should put in some effort to ensure that the file is being saved into the directory you expect.

Answer 5

If you're working with a filepath a string is usual.

If you're working with a URL you could consider using the System.Uri class e.g.

Uri myUri = new Uri(myUrl, UriKind.Absolute);

This will allow you to work with properties such as uri.Host, uri.Absolute path etc. It will also give you a string array (Segments) for the separate subfolders in the url.

MSDN info here: System.Uri