Object Oriented Programming

Files and Streams

Contents
Introduction
Sequential file I/O
Classes File and Directory
Serialization
Summary

Introduction

Most applications require data to be stored in files

Spreadsheets

Word processing

etc

C# has an extensive set of classes for handling

files of various types

These are to be found in the System.IO

namespace

Associated with files is the general concept of

streams which can be applied to both files and
networks

Introduction
FileStream object
byte stream

FileStream object
byte stream

Sequential file I/O

There are many classes in the FCL for file

handling
FileStream is the basic file for handling I/O
from binary files
The constructor opens a stream object and
specifies the filename and file access (read,
write etc)
It provides a Read() and Write() method
Its normal to enclose file handling code in a
try{} catch{} clause to catch any exceptions
thrown

Sequential file I/O

using System;
using System.IO;

class FileCopy
{
public static void Main(String[] args)
{
try{
FileStream fromStream = new FileStream(args[0],
FileMode.Open, FileAccess.Read);

FileStream toStream = new FileStream(args[1],

FileMode.Create, FileAccess.Write);

Byte[] buffer = new Byte[fromStream.Length];

fromStream.Read(buffer, 0, buffer.Length);
toStream.Write(buffer, 0, buffer.Length);
}
catch
{
Console.WriteLine("Usage: FileCopy [FromFile] [ToFile]");
}
}
}

Sequential file I/O

FileStream.Read() and FileStream.Write() are for

binary files
Data is stored in files as bytes which is efficient
but not humanly readable
A text file consists of information stored in
humanly readable form
For example the number 150 would be stored
as 1 5 0 instead of the binary
representation of 150 (10010110)
C# has a number of classes (descended from the
abstract TextReader and TextWriter classes) for
handling text i/o

Sequential file I/O

For text files, classes StreamReader and

StreamWriter are provided
These are derived from TextReader and
TextWriter
They use the familiar ReadLine() and WriteLine()
methods for doing formatted I/O
Note that the Console class has StreamReader and
StreamWriter objects and uses their ReadLine()
and WriteLine() methods for doing console-based
I/O

using System;
using System.IO;
class CreateTextFile
{
public static void Main(String[] args)
{
try
{
FileStream toStream = new FileStream(args[0],
FileMode.Create,
FileAccess.Write);
StreamWriter fileWriter = new StreamWriter(toStream);
for (int i = 0; i < 10; i++)
fileWriter.WriteLine("i= " + i);
fileWriter.Close();
toStream.Close();
FileStream fromStream = new FileStream(args[0], FileMode.Open,
FileAccess.Read);
StreamReader fileReader = new
StreamReader(fromStream);
for (int i = 0; i < 10; i++)
{
String input = fileReader.ReadLine();
Console.WriteLine(input);
}
}
catch{ Console.WriteLine("Usage: CreateTextFile OutputFile");}

Classes File and Directory

Classes File and Directory allow an
application to obtain information about files
and directories stored on disc
Each class contains a large set of static
methods for both manipulation and
information gathering
These classes could be the basis of a hard
disc scanning application to determine
usage and the amount of available storage
space

using System;
using System.Windows.Forms;
using System.IO;
public partial class FileTestForm1 : Form
{
public FileTestForm1()
{
InitializeComponent();

private void openFileDialog1_FileOk(object sender, CancelEventArgs e)

{
string fileName = openFileDialog1.FileName;
if (File.Exists(fileName))
displayFileInfo(fileName);
}
private void displayFileInfo(string fileName)
{
// Displays file information }
private void displayDirectoryInfo(string pathName)
{
// Displays directory information }
private void button1_Click(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
openFileDialog1.ShowDialog();
}
private void button2_Click(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
folderBrowserDialog1.ShowDialog();
string pathName = folderBrowserDialog1.SelectedPath;
if (Directory.Exists(pathName))
displayDirectoryInfo(pathName);
}
}

Classes File and Directory

private void displayFileInfo(string fileName)
{
outputTextBox.Text += "\r\n\r\nFile: " + fileName + ":\r\n";
DateTime creationTime = File.GetCreationTime(fileName);
outputTextBox.Text += "Created: " + creationTime.ToString() + "\r\n";
DateTime lastModifiedTime = File.GetLastAccessTime(fileName);
outputTextBox.Text += "Last accessed: " + lastModifiedTime.ToString() +
"\r\n";
}
private void displayDirectoryInfo(string pathName)
{
string[] directoryList;
directoryList = Directory.GetDirectories(pathName);
outputTextBox.Text += "\r\n\r\nDirectory Contents:\r\n";
// Output directory contents
for (int i = 0; i < directoryList.Length; i++)
outputTextBox.Text += directoryList[i] + "\r\n";
}

Serialization

It is easy to write the individual fields of a record

object to a file
For example, we can create a record that stores
information about a student
Name
Address
ID number
Course enrolled for
etc
We can output each field of this record to a file
(either text or binary)

Serialization

Record file
string string int string

StudentInfo
Name
Address
ID number
Course Info

Serialization

In this example, any program that needs to read

the file needs to know the format of the data
2 strings, an int and then a string
Also whether each item is on a separate line
Object serialization allows complete objects to be
read or written with a single statement
A serialized object is an object represented as a
sequence of bytes
Information is stored about the data types of the
objects instance fields as well as their values
Allows the object to be reconstructed (deserialized) from the file

Serialization

Record file
StudentInfo object

StudentInfo
Name
Address
ID number
Course Info

Serialization

To serialize an object, the object class needs to be

marked with the [Serializable] attribute or needs
to implement the ISerializable interface
Requires the System.Runtime.Serialization
namespace
Also we require a BinaryFormatter object to
serialize/de-serialize the object before writing to
or reading from file
Its also possible to serialize objects using
SOAP (simple object access protocol) or XML
using the appropriate formatters

Serialization
[Serializable]
class StudentInfo
{
public string Name, Address, CourseInfo;
public int ID;
public StudentInfo()
{}
public StudentInfo(String n, String a, String ci, int
id)
{
Name = n; Address = a; CourseInfo = ci;
ID = id;
}
}

Serialization
using
using
using
using

System.Windows.Forms;
System.IO;
System.Runtime.Serialization;
System.Runtime.Serialization.Formatters.Binary;

public partial class SerializerTestForm1 : Form

{
private String fileName = Directory.GetCurrentDirectory() +
"\\output1.txt";
public SerializerTestForm1()
{
InitializeComponent();
}
private void button1_Click(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
//Serialize textbox data to a binary file
}
private void button2_Click(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
//De - Serialize from a binary file back to a textbox
}
}