Question

So I am getting some files like this:

int pathLength = path.Length + 1;
var files = Directory.GetFiles ( path, "*.*", SearchOption.AllDirectories )
    .Where ( s => s.EndsWith ( ".bmp", StringComparison.OrdinalIgnoreCase ) ||
        s.EndsWith ( ".jpg", StringComparison.OrdinalIgnoreCase ) )
        .Select ( s => s.Substring ( pathLength, s.Length - pathLength ) )

    .ToList ( );

and was before sorting like this:

FileComparer fileComparer = new FileComparer ( );
files.Sort ( fileComparer );

But for Sort I need to use ToList. I am wondering if I can just add the Sort to the Linq the same way and get rid of ToList?

Answer 1

You’re looking for the OrderBy method:

var extensions = new HashSet<string>(StringComparer.OrdinalIgnoreCase) { ".bmp", ".jpg" };
int pathLength = path.Length + 1;
var files = Directory.EnumerateFiles(path, "*.*", SearchOption.AllDirectories)
    .Where(s => extensions.Contains(Path.GetExtension(s)))
    .Select(s => s.Substring(pathLength))
    .OrderBy(s => s, new FileComparer());

You can replace your FileComparer class with

.OrderBy(s => !s.Contains('\\')).ThenBy(s => s)

Since false < true, this will sort strings that start with \\ before other ones.