I have written a vb program a few years ago and now as I get started with vb again i am hitting a "snag". With sequential files. I am trying to load a file in to the vb program with the file dialog box.
NOTE:I am using structures
Dim FileDialog as new openFileDialog
Dim MyStream as Stream = nothing
Dim FileLocation as string 'this is to save the file location
if( FileDialog.ShowDialog() = DialogResults.OK)Then
FS = new FileStream(FileLocation, FileMode.open, fileaccess.Read)
BF = new BinaryFromatter
While FS.Position < FS.Length
Dim temp as unit
...'Please note that this is where the file reads the structures data.It is to much code to write in.
When I run the program I can create a file and save it with the data in and I can load it with the Dialog box, The problem is when I run the program again and try to load it. It just wont run the file or load it(Remember I created the file with this program and saved)
How do I get this to work?
Make sure you have closed the file after writing and reading the data the first time, and make sure you are using the correct path (FileLocation).
Exit Visual Studio between the first and second times you run the program. If it works then, then you know you are not closing the file properly.
Set a breakpoint at the new FileStream assignment and check the value of FileLocation. Is it the same as it was when the file was written?
Check the error message, if there is one, and see if that tells you anything.
Related
I have a question about the following code. in order to prevent problems caused by file locking I came across the following code.
Dim OrignalBitmap As New Bitmap(Application.StartupPath & "\IMAGES\BACKGROUND_LARGE.jpg")
Dim CloneBitmap As New Bitmap(OrignalBitmap)
OrignalBitmap.Dispose()
Which works like a charm. Now I have all the images in place and I can still access them as a file without anything locking. It works so well for what I need that I was thinking if its possible to do this for file formats other than images such as Csv files which are then used in a datagridview as a bound table?
Usually it is enough to open a File like this, so that it will not block other programs to access and open it.
Dim path1 As String = "C:\temp\temp.csv"
Using fs As FileStream = File.Open(path1, FileMode.Open, FileAccess.ReadWrite, FileShare.ReadWrite)
' Do something with filestream
End Using
this will prevent even huge files to open without blocking access
you should check https://learn.microsoft.com/de-de/dotnet/api/system.io.file.open?view=netframework-4.8
So I want to do this:
Open file "this.txt"
Write a line to this file (replacing anything else written to this file)
[Other stuff, irrelevant to the file]
Write a line to this file (replacing anything else written to this file)
Close the file
I thought it would be easy, but I was wrong. I tried many ways, but they all failed. Either they wouldn't let me write in an open file, or they would open the file and immediately close it (WriteAllText).
I ended up using FileOpen(), PrintLine() and FileClose() which lets me write in an open file but PrintLine only writes a new line, it doesn't replace everything in the file. Any help? Either with the printline or the whole thing
It is crucial that the file stays open until the very last moment I want it closed, (cause I have another program checking to see when this file is not open/used).
If this is about VB.NET, then you can use File.Open() with mode = FileMode.Truncate. This clears the file on opening. This assumes that the file exists.
You can also use SetLength() to truncate:
Dim f As FileStream
' FileMode.Truncate also works, but the file needs to exist from before
f = File.Open("test.txt", FileMode.OpenOrCreate, FileAccess.Write)
f.SetLength(0) ' truncate to zero size
Dim line As String = "hello2"
Dim w = New StreamWriter(f)
w.WriteLine(line)
w.Flush()
w.Close()
f.Close()
If this is about VB6, check out this question. One solution there is to import and use a native Windows function that does truncation.
In VB.Net OpenTextFileWriter does exactly what you need (docs):
Dim file As System.IO.StreamWriter
file = My.Computer.FileSystem.OpenTextFileWriter("c:\test.txt", False)
file.WriteLine("Here is the first string.")
file.Close()
I had created and text file using (AFL SCRIPTING LANGUAGE) this script will update (write) to a text file every 5 seconds. I will try to read file using vb.net, when I run the vb.net code form visual studio, everything works fine but (AFL script not able to update the text file), here is my vb.net code:
Dim FILE_NAME As New FileStream("C:\myreport\myfile.TXT", FileMode.Open, FileAccess.Read, FileShare.Read)
REM Dim FILE_NAME As String = "C:\myreport\myfile.TXT"
REM Dim TextLine As String
REM If System.IO.File.Exists(FILE_NAME) = True Then
Dim objReader As New System.IO.StreamReader(FILE_NAME)
Do While objReader.Peek() <> -1
MYSTRING(I) = objReader.ReadLine()
I = I + 1
Loop
REM End If
When I run the code above, ( AFL script not able to update the text file),
Put simply:
When I run the vb.net code (for accessing the text file), AFL script not able to update.
I had share read/write the folder (where the text file exists), no effect, same problem I am facing.
Unchecked "Enable visual studio hosting process", still problem not solved.
In .NET, the FileSystemWatcher class can help you with this problem. You can read the file each time the file watcher says that the files has changed. Here is the reference documentation for it.
You cannot read and write to a file from two processes at the same time. Well, technically you can, but it can lead to a race condition which is bad.
You need to implement some kind of shared locking mechanism around the file to prevent your two programs from fighting over it. Or, if you can guarantee that the consumer VB.NET program will have the file open for less than 5 seconds, you can go with MrAxel's solution and simply have the VB.NET program read the file every time it is updated.
I'm sure this is really simple, but has had me stumped for a while!
I need to show the user a text file, with lines being written to it as my program executes. Stuff like "Working on this file - Successful!". Another forum thread has helped me to allow the text file to be accessed by multiple processes, but now when I open the text file using Process.Start, it doesn't show the lines that are being written using the StreamWriter. Any help very much appreciated.
Code:
Dim ExportLog As String = "C:\ExportLog.txt"
If System.IO.File.Exists(ExportLog) Then
System.IO.File.Delete(ExportLog)
End If
Using writeStream = System.IO.File.Open(ExportLog,
FileMode.OpenOrCreate, FileAccess.ReadWrite,
FileShare.ReadWrite), Write As New StreamWriter(writeStream)
Write.WriteLine("Starting")
End Using
Dim MyLog As Process = Process.Start(ExportLog)
I am working on a GUI for a simulation program. The simulation program is a single .exe which is driven by an input file (File.inp placed in the same directory).
The Original.inp file functions as a template from which the form reads all the values into an array. Then it changes these values reflecting the changes done by the user in the form. After that it writes all the new values to File.inp.
By pushing the "Run" button the Simulation.exe file is executed.
The folder structure looks like this:
root
|
|---input
| |
| |--Original.inp
|
|---GUI.exe
|---Simulation.exe
|---File.inp
Ideally I would supply only the GUI, the user would select the working directory and then the GUI.exe would create an input folder and extract the Original.inp and Simulation.exe in the appropriate locations. So far I have only managed to include Original.inp and Simulation.exe as "EmbeddedResources" in my VB project and I have let my code create an input folder in the working directory chosen by the user.
Can someone please explain to me how I can extract the .inp and .exe file into the correct directories? I've searched on google, tried File.WriteAllBytes and Filestream.WriteByte but did not get the desired results.
The problem with File.WriteAllBytes was that I could not point to the embedded resource ("Simulation.exe is not a member of Resources" and with Filestream.WriteByte I got a 0 kb file.
The question commenters are correct, this is probably a task best left for a setup program. However, that having been stated, in the interest of answering the question as asked I offer the following approach.
Contrary to your supposition in your question comment, you do need to "read" the embedded resource from the GUI's executable file, since it's an embedded resource and not an external resource. It won't magically extract itselt from the executable file. You need to do the manual read from the assembly and write to your specified locations. To do this, you need to read the resource using .Net Reflection, via the currently executing assembly's GetManifestResourceStream method.
The Simulation.exe file is a binary file so it must be handled as such. I assumed that the Orginal.inp file was a text file since it afforded the opportunity to demonstrate different types of file reads and writes. Any error handling (and there should be plenty) is omitted for brevity.
The code could look something like this:
Imports System.IO
Imports System.Reflection
Module Module1
Sub Main()
'Determine where the GUI executable is located and save for later use
Dim thisAssembly As Assembly = Assembly.GetExecutingAssembly()
Dim appFolder As String = Path.GetDirectoryName(thisAssembly.Location)
Dim fileContents As String = String.Empty
'Read the contents of the template file. It was assumed this is in text format so a
'StreamReader, adept at reading text files, was used to read the entire file into a string
'N.B. The namespace that prefixes the file name in the next line is CRITICAL. An embedded resource
'is placed in the executable with the namespace noted in the project file, so it must be
'dereferenced in the same manner.
Using fileStream As Stream = thisAssembly.GetManifestResourceStream("SOQuestion10613051.Original.inp")
If fileStream IsNot Nothing Then
Using textStreamReader As New StreamReader(fileStream)
fileContents = textStreamReader.ReadToEnd()
textStreamReader.Close()
End Using
fileStream.Close()
End If
End Using
'Create the "input" subfolder if it doesn't already exist
Dim inputFolder As String = Path.Combine(appFolder, "input")
If Not Directory.Exists(inputFolder) Then
Directory.CreateDirectory(inputFolder)
End If
'Write the contents of the resource read above to the input sub-folder
Using writer As New StreamWriter(Path.Combine(inputFolder, "Original.inp"))
writer.Write(fileContents)
writer.Close()
End Using
'Now read the simulation executable. The same namespace issues noted above still apply.
'Since this is a binary file we use a file stream to read into a byte buffer
Dim buffer() As Byte = Nothing
Using fileStream As Stream = thisAssembly.GetManifestResourceStream("SOQuestion10613051.Simulation.exe")
If fileStream IsNot Nothing Then
ReDim buffer(fileStream.Length)
fileStream.Read(buffer, 0, fileStream.Length)
fileStream.Close()
End If
End Using
'Now write the byte buffer with the contents of the executable file to the root folder
If buffer IsNot Nothing Then
Using exeStream As New FileStream(Path.Combine(appFolder, "Simulation.exe"), FileMode.Create, FileAccess.Write, FileShare.None)
exeStream.Write(buffer, 0, buffer.Length)
exeStream.Close()
End Using
End If
End Sub
End Module
You will also have to add logic to determine if the files have been extracted so it doesn't happen every time the GUI is invoked. That's a big reason why an installation program might be the correct answer.