How to programmatically derive Windows Downloads folder "%USERPROFILE%/Downloads"?
.net, environment-variables, special-folders, windows-vista
Solution
The problem of your first answer is it would give you WRONG result if the default Downloads Dir has been changed to [Download1]! The proper way to do it covering all possibilities is
using System;
using System.Runtime.InteropServices;
static class cGetEnvVars_WinExp {
[DllImport("Shell32.dll")] private static extern int SHGetKnownFolderPath(
[MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.LPStruct)]Guid rfid, uint dwFlags, IntPtr hToken,
out IntPtr ppszPath);
[Flags] public enum KnownFolderFlags : uint { SimpleIDList = 0x00000100
, NotParentRelative = 0x00000200, DefaultPath = 0x00000400, Init = 0x00000800
, NoAlias = 0x00001000, DontUnexpand = 0x00002000, DontVerify = 0x00004000
, Create = 0x00008000,NoAppcontainerRedirection = 0x00010000, AliasOnly = 0x80000000
}
public static string GetPath(string RegStrName, KnownFolderFlags flags, bool defaultUser) {
IntPtr outPath;
int result =
SHGetKnownFolderPath (
new Guid(RegStrName), (uint)flags, new IntPtr(defaultUser ? -1 : 0), out outPath
);
if (result >= 0) {
return Marshal.PtrToStringUni(outPath);
} else {
throw new ExternalException("Unable to retrieve the known folder path. It may not "
+ "be available on this system.", result);
}
}
}
To test it, if you specifically desire your personal download dir, you flag default to false -->
using System.IO;
class Program {
[STAThread]
static void Main(string[] args) {
string path2Downloads = string.Empty;
path2Downloads =
cGetEnvVars_WinExp.GetPath("{374DE290-123F-4565-9164-39C4925E467B}", cGetEnvVars_WinExp.KnownFolderFlags.DontVerify, false);
string[] files = { "" };
if (Directory.Exists(path2Downloads)) {
files = Directory.GetFiles(path2Downloads);
}
}
Problem
In .NET, we can retrieve the paths to 'special folders', like Documents / Desktop etc. Today I tried to find a way to get the path to the 'Downloads' folder, but it's not special enough it seems. I know I can just do 'C:\Users\Username\Downloads', but that seems an ugly solution. So how can I retrieve the path using .NET?