CODEWITHSUNDEEP
c#file-move
Marshal Alessi
Marshal Alessi

Reputation: 105

File.Exists + File.Move Erroring "The process cannot access the file because it is being used by another process."

I have what I thought would be a very simple file mover script. It checks for a file and moves it to a new directory if it exists:

if (File.Exists(_collection[x,0]))
{
    System.IO.File.Move(_collection[x, 0], _moveTo);
    MessageBox.Show("File moved because it was stale.");
}

It passes the check that the file exists, but then errors on the following line when trying to move it stating that the file is being used by another process. I can only assume that File.Exists is causing it to hang up somehow, but can't find a solution from anyone else who had this problem.

Upvotes: 1

Views: 16530

Answers (2)

JasonG
JasonG

Reputation: 137

In case anyone else has this problem. In my case, the file had been opened in Excel and Excel was never garbage collected after being terminated. So the OS still thought the file was being accessed. I did the following, crude, but it works.

                for (int i = 1; i > 0; i++)
                {
                     try
                     {
                         File.Move(sourceFileName, destinationFileName);
                         break;
                     } catch
                     {
                         GC.Collect();
                     }
                }

Upvotes: 3

C.Fasolin
C.Fasolin

Reputation: 319

try this code:

    string filePathNameToMove = "";
    string directoryPathToMove = "";

    if (File.Exists(filePathNameToMove))
    {
        string destinationFilePathName = 
               Path.Combine(directoryPathToMove, Path.GetFileName(filePathNameToMove));
        if (!File.Exists(destinationFilePathName))
        {
            try
            {
                File.Move(filePathNameToMove, destinationFilePathName);
                Console.WriteLine("File Moved!");
            }
            catch (Exception e)
            {
                Console.WriteLine("File Not Moved! Error:" + e.Message);

            }
        }
    }

Upvotes: 1

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