C# – Checking for directory and file write permissions in .NET

cdirectoryfile-permissionsnetwinforms

In my .NET 2.0 application, I need to check if sufficient permissions exist to create and write to files to a directory. To this end, I have the following function that attempts to create a file and write a single byte to it, deleting itself afterwards to test that permissions do exist.

I figured the best way to check was to actually try and do it, catching any exceptions that occur. I'm not particularly happy about the general Exception catch though, so is there a better or perhaps a more accepted way of doing this?

private const string TEMP_FILE = "\\tempFile.tmp";

/// <summary>
/// Checks the ability to create and write to a file in the supplied directory.
/// </summary>
/// <param name="directory">String representing the directory path to check.</param>
/// <returns>True if successful; otherwise false.</returns>
private static bool CheckDirectoryAccess(string directory)
{
    bool success = false;
    string fullPath = directory + TEMP_FILE;

    if (Directory.Exists(directory))
    {
        try
        {
            using (FileStream fs = new FileStream(fullPath, FileMode.CreateNew, 
                                                            FileAccess.Write))
            {
                fs.WriteByte(0xff);
            }

            if (File.Exists(fullPath))
            {
                File.Delete(fullPath);
                success = true;
            }
        }
        catch (Exception)
        {
            success = false;
        }
    }

Best Answer

Directory.GetAccessControl(path) does what you are asking for.

public static bool HasWritePermissionOnDir(string path)
{
    var writeAllow = false;
    var writeDeny = false;
    var accessControlList = Directory.GetAccessControl(path);
    if (accessControlList == null)
        return false;
    var accessRules = accessControlList.GetAccessRules(true, true, 
                                typeof(System.Security.Principal.SecurityIdentifier));
    if (accessRules ==null)
        return false;

    foreach (FileSystemAccessRule rule in accessRules)
    {
        if ((FileSystemRights.Write & rule.FileSystemRights) != FileSystemRights.Write) 
            continue;

        if (rule.AccessControlType == AccessControlType.Allow)
            writeAllow = true;
        else if (rule.AccessControlType == AccessControlType.Deny)
            writeDeny = true;
    }

    return writeAllow && !writeDeny;
}

(FileSystemRights.Write & rights) == FileSystemRights.Write is using something called "Flags" btw which if you don't know what it is you should really read up on :)

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