Absolute to Relative path

Question

I'm getting a file from an OpenFileDialog which returns a string with the absolute path to the selected file. Now I want that path as a relative path to a given path (in this case the path to my application).

So let's say I get a path to the file: c:\myDock\programming\myProject\Properties\AssemblyInfo.cs

and my application is located in

c:\myDock\programming\otherProject\bin\Debug\program.exe

then I want the result:

..\..\..\myProject\Properties\AssemblyInfo.cs

See my answer http://stackoverflow.com/a/23697173/64334 – Ronnie Overby May 16 '14 at 15:55 — Ronnie Overby, May 16 '14 at 15:55

score 33 · Accepted Answer · edited Apr 10 '20 at 03:05

33

The Uri class has a MakeRelativeUri method that can help.

public static string MakeRelative(string filePath, string referencePath)
{
    var fileUri = new Uri(filePath);
    var referenceUri = new Uri(referencePath);
    return Uri.UnescapeDataString(referenceUri.MakeRelativeUri(fileUri).ToString()).Replace('/', Path.DirectorySeparatorChar);
}

var result = MakeRelative(@"C:\dirName\dirName2\file.txt", @"C:\dirName\");

edited Apr 10 '20 at 03:05

zumalifeguard

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answered Nov 07 '12 at 09:30

Sisyphe

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You're absolutely right, I was editing my answer as you were commenting ;) – Sisyphe Nov 07 '12 at 09:45
Its all right, the link which I posted will be helpful for others too. – Mr_Green Nov 07 '12 at 09:46
Thx for the link edit ^^ – Sisyphe Nov 07 '12 at 10:16
4

Technically, to have the path with backslashes, you should add `.Replace('/', Path.DirectorySeparatorChar)` behind the `.ToString()`. – Nyerguds Aug 22 '14 at 23:10
Thanks for the tip. It's nice to see constructive comments that add value to the answer after 2 years :) – Sisyphe Aug 25 '14 at 07:46
This does not handle all edge cases. See [this](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/275689/how-to-get-relative-path-from-absolute-path/32113484#32113484) answer. – Muhammad Rehan Saeed Aug 20 '15 at 10:45
This fails if the filename contains characters that have to be URL encoded (e.g. spaces), you need to add Uri.UnescapeDataString – HH321 Aug 02 '18 at 08:08
This only works if the referencePath is a directory ending with a directory separator. – chtenb Nov 17 '20 at 16:05

Absolute to Relative path

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