Directory.Move(String, String) Method
Definition
Important
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Moves a file or a directory and its contents to a new location.
public:
static void Move(System::String ^ sourceDirName, System::String ^ destDirName);public static void Move(string sourceDirName, string destDirName);static member Move : string * string -> unitPublic Shared Sub Move (sourceDirName As String, destDirName As String)Parameters
- sourceDirName
- String
The path of the file or directory to move.
- destDirName
- String
The path to the new location for sourceDirName or its contents. If sourceDirName is a file, then destDirName must also be a file name.
Exceptions
An attempt was made to move a directory to a different volume.
-or-
destDirName already exists. See the note in the Remarks section.
-or-
The sourceDirName and destDirName parameters refer to the same file or directory.
-or-
The directory or a file within it is being used by another process.
The caller does not have the required permission.
.NET Framework and .NET Core versions older than 2.1: sourceDirName or destDirName is a zero-length string, contains only white space, or contains one or more invalid characters. You can query for invalid characters with the GetInvalidPathChars() method.
sourceDirName or destDirName is null.
The specified path, file name, or both exceed the system-defined maximum length.
The path specified by sourceDirName is invalid (for example, it is on an unmapped drive).
Examples
The following example demonstrates how to move a directory and all its files to a new directory. The original directory no longer exists after it has been moved.
using System;
using System.IO;
partial class Program
{
static void DirectoryMoveExample()
{
string sourceDirectory = @"C:\source";
string destinationDirectory = @"C:\destination";
try
{
Directory.Move(sourceDirectory, destinationDirectory);
}
catch (Exception e)
{
Console.WriteLine(e.Message);
}
}
}
open System.IO
let sourceDirectory = @"C:\source"
let destinationDirectory = @"C:\destination"
try
Directory.Move(sourceDirectory, destinationDirectory)
with e ->
printfn $"{e.Message}"
Imports System.IO
Partial Class Program
Shared Sub DirectoryMoveExample()
Dim sourceDirectory As String = "C:\source"
Dim destinationDirectory As String = "C:\destination"
Try
Directory.Move(sourceDirectory, destinationDirectory)
Catch e As Exception
Console.WriteLine(e.Message)
End Try
End Sub
End Class
Remarks
This method creates a new directory with the name specified by destDirName and moves the contents of sourceDirName, including files and directories, to the newly created destination directory. It then deletes the sourceDirName directory.
If you try to move a directory to a directory that already exists, an IOException will occur.
The sourceDirName and destDirName arguments are permitted to specify relative or absolute path information. Relative path information is interpreted as relative to the current working directory. To obtain the current working directory, see GetCurrentDirectory.
Trailing spaces are removed from the end of the path parameters before moving the directory.
For a list of common I/O tasks, see Common I/O Tasks.
Note
Starting with .NET Core 3.0, the Move method throws an IOException in all platforms when the destDirName already exists. In .NET Core 2.2 and previous versions, the exception was only thrown on Windows, and other platforms could either fail or overwrite the destDirName. See C++ rename.
