Question

I have this file: C:\Documents and Settings\extryasam\My Documents\Visual Studio 2010\Projects\FCR\WebApplication4\config\roles.txt and I want to import it into my C# application. If I insert the full path it’s ok, but I want to do something similar to what we do with websites, and that is “\config\roles.txt”

However with the below code, this is not working.

This is my code:

    public string authenticate()
    {
        WindowsIdentity curIdentity = WindowsIdentity.GetCurrent();
        WindowsPrincipal myPrincipal = new WindowsPrincipal(curIdentity);

        //String role = "NT\\Internet Users";

        //string filePath = Server.MapPath("config/roles.txt");
        //string filePath = (@"~/WebApplication4/config/roles.txt");
        //string filePath = Path.GetDirectoryName(@"\config\roles.txt");
        string filePath = Path.GetPathRoot(@"/config/roles.txt");
        string line;
        string role = "";

        if (File.Exists(filePath))
        {
            StreamReader file = null;
            try
            {
                file = new StreamReader(filePath);
                while ((line = file.ReadLine()) != null)
                {
                    role = line;
                }
            }
            finally
            {
                if (file != null)
                {
                    file.Close();
                }
            }
        } 

        if (!myPrincipal.IsInRole(@role))
        {
            return "401.aspx";
        }
        else
        {
            return "#";
        }
    }

Answer 1

In ASP.NET, you can use ~/config/roles.txt – in combination with Server.MapPath(), you can get the full path.

[…] ASP.NET includes the Web application root operator (~), which
you can use when specifying a path in server controls. ASP.NET
resolves the ~ operator to the root of the current application. You
can use the ~ operator in conjunction with folders to specify a path
that is based on the current root.
(see http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms178116.aspx)

So you could try the following:

string filePath = System.Web.HttpContext.Current.Server.MapPath("~/config/roles.txt");