Accessing Resources in a C# WPF Application (Same Assembly)

Question

(Before I jump into the nitty-gritty, I want to set the context: I'm trying to load a WPF frame with the contents of an .html file that I'm including in my project as a resource.)

I create a new WPF Application; I add a new folder called 'foofiles' to the project, and I add a couple of files (page1.foo and page2.foo) to that folder.

For each newly added .foo file, I right-click on it, go to "Properties," and set the Build Action to 'Resource,' and the Copy To Output Directory to "Copy always."

I want to be able to access those files both in XAML:

<Frame x:Name="bar" Source="/foofiles/page1.foo"/>

And in procedural code:

private void someFunc()
{
    bar.Source = new Uri("/foofiles/page1.foo");
}

But I just can't figure out why this doesn't work -- I get a "Format of the URI could not be determined."

In the code-behind, I tried doing this:

private void someFunc()
{
    bar.Source = new Uri("pack://application:,,,/foofiles/page1.foo");
}

which didn't throw an exception, but my main window crashed.

In my thinking, if I add a file of any type to my project, and if I mark it as "Resource" in "Build Action," I should be able to use that file per my examples above. Also, I would like to use that file like this:

private void someOtherFunc()
{
    System.IO.StreamReader reader = new System.IO.StreamReader("/foofiles/page1.foo");
    string bar = reader.ReadToEnd();
}

Any help would be appreciated... thanks in advance!

mkoertgen · Accepted Answer · 2013-08-15 17:02:33Z

8

Try adding the component-part to your Pack URI like this

pack://application:,,,/AssemblyName;component/ResourceName

where AssemblyName is the name of your assembly. So for your case, the following statement should work:

bar.Source = new Uri("pack://application:,,,/AssemblyName;component/foofiles/page1.foo");

More practically, try the relative pack uri notation:

bar.Source = new Uri("AssemblyName;component/foofiles/page1.foo", UriKind.Relative));

For stream reading resources use

var streamResourceInfo = Application.GetResourceStream(uri);
using (var stream = streamResourceInfo.Stream)
{
   // do fancy stuff with stream
}

answered Aug 15, 2013 at 17:02

mkoertgen

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4 Comments

mkoertgen Over a year ago

Also note that Pack Uris are WPF-specific, so StreamReader is not aware of them.

Literata Over a year ago

Thanks for the response... your last code fragment showing how to stream read resources works like a charm! (Unfortunately, both variants of crafting the Uri for use in loading Frame.Source both give a System.NotImplementedException in System.dll. I just figured out how to break on CLR exceptions, however, and I'm gonna try to run that problem to ground. Again, many thanks!

Literata Over a year ago

It turns out that my issue involved the context -- WPF doesn't allow you to load a frame.Source from an html file resource. (You can do it using 'siteoforigin' but that means you're fetching the data from a file that's external to your assembly.) Many thanks to you!

mkoertgen Over a year ago

You're welcome. I wasn't aware that WPF doesn't allow loading frame sources. Glad my response did help (at least partially).

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