Question

PROBLEM:

In my Program, when I try to loop the entire List of file found, I got exactly the 8 files on my List BUT displayed the same data value.

DEFINITION:
Class:

1.SearchFile.cs = has a method that accepts 2 parameters(PathToSearch and fileExtensionToSearch) then returns a List of “FileDetails” type.

    public List<FileDetails> fileListFound = new List<FileDetails>();

    public List<FileDetails> GetListFiles(string strPath, string strFileExtension)
    {

        DirectoryInfo dirInfo = new DirectoryInfo(strPath);
        FileInfo[] files = dirInfo.GetFiles(strFileExtension, SearchOption.AllDirectories);

        FileDetails fileDetails = new FileDetails();
        foreach (FileInfo  currentFile in files)
        {
            fileDetails.FileFullName = currentFile.FullName;
            fileDetails.FileFullPath = strPath;

            fileListFound.Add(fileDetails);

        }

        return fileListFound;
    }          

2.FileDetails.cs

 class FileDetails
{
    public string FileFullName { get; set; }
    public string FileFullPath { get; set; }
    public string FileType { get; set; }

}

1. My Main Program:

   static void Main(string[] args)
   {
       string strPath = @"C:\Users\Public\Pictures\Sample Pictures";
   
       FileCollection fileCollected = new FileCollection();
       List<FileDetails> listOfFileFound = fileCollected.GetListFiles(strPath, "*.jpg");
       foreach (FileDetails fileFound in listOfFileFound)
       {
           Console.WriteLine("Full Name: " + fileFound.FileFullName + ", Path:" + fileFound.FileFullPath);
       }
       Console.ReadLine();
   }
   

NOTE: Im using Console application just to be clear with my Problem.

Sample Output: (8 files found)

…\Pictures**Tulips.jpg**

…\Pictures**Tulips.jpg**

…\Pictures**Tulips.jpg**

etc.. looped 8 times with the same output

NOTE: I can tell that the SearchFile.cs Class found the 8 different files then add it to my List and return it successfully by putting some breakpoints (Debug).

Answer 1

You are always modifying the same instance of fileDetails. You need to allocate a new one inside the loop at every iteration:

    foreach (FileInfo  currentFile in files)
    {
        FileDetails fileDetails = new FileDetails();
        fileDetails.FileFullName = currentFile.FullName;
        fileDetails.FileFullPath = strPath;

        fileListFound.Add(fileDetails);

    }

Since fileDetails is a reference that gets added to the list, modifying the same instance will cause all the values in the list to be the same.