Move all files from one folder to another in C#
This post will discuss how to move all files from one folder to another in C#.
1. Using Directory.Move() method
The standard solution to move a directory and all its contents to a new location is the Directory.Move() method. It accepts the path of the directory to move, and the destination path. It works by creating a new destination directory and moving all contents of the source folder to it. The move includes all files and subdirectories present in the source directory. Finally, it deletes the source directory. Note, both source and destination can be relative or absolute paths.
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using System; using System.IO; public class Program { public static void Main() { string srcDir = @"C:\source"; string destDir = @"C:\destination"; Directory.Move(srcDir, destDir); } } |
If you attempt to move to a directory that already exists, the system will throw an IOException exception. If the specified source path is invalid, the DirectoryNotFoundException exception is thrown. Before invoking the Directory.Move() method, you might want to explicitly check if the source folder exists and the destination doesn’t.
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using System; using System.IO; public class Program { public static void Main() { string srcDir = @"C:\source"; string destDir = @"C:\destination"; if (Directory.Exists(srcDir) && !Directory.Exists(destDir)) { Directory.Move(srcDir, destDir); } } } |
If you want to overwrite the destination directory if it already exists, you can do so by invoking the Directory.Delete() method. The following example illustrates.
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using System; using System.IO; public class Program { public static void Main() { string srcDir = @"C:\source"; string destDir = @"C:\destination"; if (Directory.Exists(srcDir)) { if (Directory.Exists(destDir)) { Directory.Delete(destDir, true); } Directory.Move(srcDir, destDir); } } } |
2. Using FileInfo.MoveTo() method
If you need to move only the files present in the source location to the destination, you can do so using the MoveTo() method from the FileInfo class. It takes the destination path and moves the specified file to it. To move all files in a directory, you need to individually invoke the MoveTo() method for each file.
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using System; using System.IO; public class Program { public static void Main() { string srcDir = @"C:\source"; string destDir = @"C:\destination"; DirectoryInfo dir = new DirectoryInfo(srcDir); foreach (FileInfo file in dir.GetFiles()) { file.MoveTo($@"{destDir}\{file.Name}"); } } } |
The system throws DirectoryNotFoundException if the source or the destination directory does not exist. Additionally, FileInfo.MoveTo() cannot overwrite an existing file in the destination directory, and IOException is raised. The following program handles both:
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using System; using System.IO; public class Program { public static void Main() { string srcDir = @"C:\source"; string destDir = @"C:\destination"; if (Directory.Exists(srcDir) && Directory.Exists(destDir)) { DirectoryInfo dir = new DirectoryInfo(srcDir); foreach (FileInfo file in dir.GetFiles()) { string destFile = Path.Combine(destDir, file.Name); if (!File.Exists(destFile)) { file.MoveTo(destFile); } } } } } |
3. Using File.Move() method
Alternatively, you can use the File.Move() method to move all files present in the source directory to the destination directory. Similar to the MoveTo() method, you need to invoke the Move() method for each file.
The following code example demonstrates calling this method. Note, it uses the EnumerateFiles() method over the GetFiles() method, which returns an enumerable collection of file names instead of loading all the file names in memory.
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using System; using System.IO; public class Program { public static void Main() { string srcDir = @"C:\source"; string destDir = @"C:\destination"; foreach (string file in Directory.EnumerateFiles(srcDir)) { string destFile = Path.Combine(destDir, Path.GetFileName(file)); File.Move(file, destFile); } } } |
The above program throws DirectoryNotFoundException if either of the directories doesn’t exist. Additionally, if a file already exists in the destination directory, the IOException exception is thrown. Both these cases can be handled as follows:
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using System; using System.IO; public class Program { public static void Main() { string srcDir = @"C:\source"; string destDir = @"C:\destination"; if (Directory.Exists(srcDir) && Directory.Exists(destDir)) { foreach (string file in Directory.EnumerateFiles(srcDir)) { string destFile = Path.Combine(destDir, Path.GetFileName(file)); if (!File.Exists(destFile)) { File.Move(file, destFile); } } } } } |
That’s all about moving all files from one folder to another in C#.
Thanks for reading.
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