Saving data to a file in C #

Question

So, I'm currently working on a project to create an automatic character page for playing with the Pathfinder role-playing game, and I don’t understand how to save the data. I want to save the current value of all my variables in a file with the extension .pfcsheet and open it later. I googled around and can't find anything that says how to do this, just how to save the contents of a text field. I tried using the saveFileDialog control, but it continues to give me the error "file name is invalid" and no one seems to know why.

Answer 1

I just wrote a blog post about storing object data in Binary, XML or Json . It sounds like you probably want to use binary serialization, but maybe you want the files to be edited outside of your application, in which case XML or Json might be better. Here are the functions that can be done in various formats. See my blog post for more details.

Binary

/// <summary>
/// Writes the given object instance to a binary file.
/// <para>Object type (and all child types) must be decorated with the [Serializable] attribute.</para>
/// <para>To prevent a variable from being serialized, decorate it with the [NonSerialized] attribute; cannot be applied to properties.</para>
/// </summary>
/// <typeparam name="T">The type of object being written to the XML file.</typeparam>
/// <param name="filePath">The file path to write the object instance to.</param>
/// <param name="objectToWrite">The object instance to write to the XML file.</param>
/// <param name="append">If false the file will be overwritten if it already exists. If true the contents will be appended to the file.</param>
public static void WriteToBinaryFile<T>(string filePath, T objectToWrite, bool append = false)
{
    using (Stream stream = File.Open(filePath, append ? FileMode.Append : FileMode.Create))
    {
        var binaryFormatter = new System.Runtime.Serialization.Formatters.Binary.BinaryFormatter();
        binaryFormatter.Serialize(stream, objectToWrite);
    }
}

/// <summary>
/// Reads an object instance from a binary file.
/// </summary>
/// <typeparam name="T">The type of object to read from the XML.</typeparam>
/// <param name="filePath">The file path to read the object instance from.</param>
/// <returns>Returns a new instance of the object read from the binary file.</returns>
public static T ReadFromBinaryFile<T>(string filePath)
{
    using (Stream stream = File.Open(filePath, FileMode.Open))
    {
        var binaryFormatter = new System.Runtime.Serialization.Formatters.Binary.BinaryFormatter();
        return (T)binaryFormatter.Deserialize(stream);
    }
}

XML

This requires the System.Xml assembly to be included in your project.

/// <summary>
/// Writes the given object instance to an XML file.
/// <para>Only Public properties and variables will be written to the file. These can be any type though, even other classes.</para>
/// <para>If there are public properties/variables that you do not want written to the file, decorate them with the [XmlIgnore] attribute.</para>
/// <para>Object type must have a parameterless constructor.</para>
/// </summary>
/// <typeparam name="T">The type of object being written to the file.</typeparam>
/// <param name="filePath">The file path to write the object instance to.</param>
/// <param name="objectToWrite">The object instance to write to the file.</param>
/// <param name="append">If false the file will be overwritten if it already exists. If true the contents will be appended to the file.</param>
public static void WriteToXmlFile<T>(string filePath, T objectToWrite, bool append = false) where T : new()
{
    TextWriter writer = null;
    try
    {
        var serializer = new XmlSerializer(typeof(T));
        writer = new StreamWriter(filePath, append);
        serializer.Serialize(writer, objectToWrite);
    }
    finally
    {
        if (writer != null)
            writer.Close();
    }
}

/// <summary>
/// Reads an object instance from an XML file.
/// <para>Object type must have a parameterless constructor.</para>
/// </summary>
/// <typeparam name="T">The type of object to read from the file.</typeparam>
/// <param name="filePath">The file path to read the object instance from.</param>
/// <returns>Returns a new instance of the object read from the XML file.</returns>
public static T ReadFromXmlFile<T>(string filePath) where T : new()
{
    TextReader reader = null;
    try
    {
        var serializer = new XmlSerializer(typeof(T));
        reader = new StreamReader(filePath);
        return (T)serializer.Deserialize(reader);
    }
    finally
    {
        if (reader != null)
            reader.Close();
    }
}

Json

You must include a link to the Newtonsoft.Json assembly, which can be obtained from the Json.NET NuGet package .

/// <summary>
/// Writes the given object instance to a Json file.
/// <para>Object type must have a parameterless constructor.</para>
/// <para>Only Public properties and variables will be written to the file. These can be any type though, even other classes.</para>
/// <para>If there are public properties/variables that you do not want written to the file, decorate them with the [JsonIgnore] attribute.</para>
/// </summary>
/// <typeparam name="T">The type of object being written to the file.</typeparam>
/// <param name="filePath">The file path to write the object instance to.</param>
/// <param name="objectToWrite">The object instance to write to the file.</param>
/// <param name="append">If false the file will be overwritten if it already exists. If true the contents will be appended to the file.</param>
public static void WriteToJsonFile<T>(string filePath, T objectToWrite, bool append = false) where T : new()
{
    TextWriter writer = null;
    try
    {
        var contentsToWriteToFile = JsonConvert.SerializeObject(objectToWrite);
        writer = new StreamWriter(filePath, append);
        writer.Write(contentsToWriteToFile);
    }
    finally
    {
        if (writer != null)
            writer.Close();
    }
}

/// <summary>
/// Reads an object instance from an Json file.
/// <para>Object type must have a parameterless constructor.</para>
/// </summary>
/// <typeparam name="T">The type of object to read from the file.</typeparam>
/// <param name="filePath">The file path to read the object instance from.</param>
/// <returns>Returns a new instance of the object read from the Json file.</returns>
public static T ReadFromJsonFile<T>(string filePath) where T : new()
{
    TextReader reader = null;
    try
    {
        reader = new StreamReader(filePath);
        var fileContents = reader.ReadToEnd();
        return JsonConvert.DeserializeObject<T>(fileContents);
    }
    finally
    {
        if (reader != null)
            reader.Close();
    }
}

Example

// To save the characterSheet variable contents to a file.
WriteToBinaryFile<CharacterSheet>("C:\CharacterSheet.pfcsheet", characterSheet);

// To load the file contents back into a variable.
CharacterSheet characterSheet = ReadFromBinaryFile<CharacterSheet>("C:\CharacterSheet.pfcsheet");

Answer 2

I think you might need something like this

// Compose a string that consists of three lines.
string lines = "First line.\r\nSecond line.\r\nThird line.";

// Write the string to a file.
System.IO.StreamWriter file = new System.IO.StreamWriter("c:\\test.txt");
file.WriteLine(lines);

file.Close();

Answer 3

XMLSerializer.

, - .

, XML. StreamWriter.

serializer , , .

, Microsoft:

using System;

public class clsPerson
{
  public  string FirstName;
  public  string MI;
  public  string LastName;
}

class class1
{ 
   static void Main(string[] args)
   {
      clsPerson p=new clsPerson();
      p.FirstName = "Jeff";
      p.MI = "A";
      p.LastName = "Price";
      System.Xml.Serialization.XmlSerializer x = new System.Xml.Serialization.XmlSerializer(p.GetType());

      // at this step, instead of passing Console.Out, you can pass in a 
      // Streamwriter to write the contents to a file of your choosing.
      x.Serialize(Console.Out, p);


      Console.WriteLine();
      Console.ReadLine();
   }
} 

Answer 4

, Sachin's. "using" :

        // using System.IO;
        string filepath = @"C:\test.txt";
        using (StreamWriter writer = new StreamWriter(filepath))
        {
            writer.WriteLine("some text");
        }

using Statement ( #)

Answer 5

MSDN , :

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/8bh11f1k.aspx

, , .

Answer 6

System.IO( File FileInfo), .

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.io.file.aspx

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/system.io.fileinfo.aspx

Answer 7

:

System.IO.File.WriteAllText(@"D:\file.txt", content);

, , , . , , .

https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms143375%28v=vs.110%29.aspx?f=255&MSPPError=-2147217396

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