FileSystemWatcher.Filter Property

Definition

Namespace:

System.IO

Assemblies:

netstandard.dll, System.IO.FileSystem.Watcher.dll

Source:

FileSystemWatcher.cs

Gets or sets the filter string used to determine what files are monitored in a directory.

C#

public string Filter { get; set; }

Property Value

String

The filter string. The default is "*.*" (Watches all files.)

Examples

The following example creates a FileSystemWatcher to watch the directory specified at run time. The component is set to watch for changes in LastWrite and LastAccess time, the creation, deletion, or renaming of text files in the directory. If a file is changed, created, or deleted, the path to the file prints to the console. When a file is renamed, the old and new paths print to the console.

C#

using System;
using System.IO;

namespace MyNamespace
{
    class MyClassCS
    {
        static void Main()
        {
            using var watcher = new FileSystemWatcher(@"C:\path\to\folder");

            watcher.NotifyFilter = NotifyFilters.Attributes
                                 | NotifyFilters.CreationTime
                                 | NotifyFilters.DirectoryName
                                 | NotifyFilters.FileName
                                 | NotifyFilters.LastAccess
                                 | NotifyFilters.LastWrite
                                 | NotifyFilters.Security
                                 | NotifyFilters.Size;

            watcher.Changed += OnChanged;
            watcher.Created += OnCreated;
            watcher.Deleted += OnDeleted;
            watcher.Renamed += OnRenamed;
            watcher.Error += OnError;

            watcher.Filter = "*.txt";
            watcher.IncludeSubdirectories = true;
            watcher.EnableRaisingEvents = true;

            Console.WriteLine("Press enter to exit.");
            Console.ReadLine();
        }

        private static void OnChanged(object sender, FileSystemEventArgs e)
        {
            if (e.ChangeType != WatcherChangeTypes.Changed)
            {
                return;
            }
            Console.WriteLine($"Changed: {e.FullPath}");
        }

        private static void OnCreated(object sender, FileSystemEventArgs e)
        {
            string value = $"Created: {e.FullPath}";
            Console.WriteLine(value);
        }

        private static void OnDeleted(object sender, FileSystemEventArgs e) =>
            Console.WriteLine($"Deleted: {e.FullPath}");

        private static void OnRenamed(object sender, RenamedEventArgs e)
        {
            Console.WriteLine($"Renamed:");
            Console.WriteLine($"    Old: {e.OldFullPath}");
            Console.WriteLine($"    New: {e.FullPath}");
        }

        private static void OnError(object sender, ErrorEventArgs e) =>
            PrintException(e.GetException());

        private static void PrintException(Exception? ex)
        {
            if (ex != null)
            {
                Console.WriteLine($"Message: {ex.Message}");
                Console.WriteLine("Stacktrace:");
                Console.WriteLine(ex.StackTrace);
                Console.WriteLine();
                PrintException(ex.InnerException);
            }
        }
    }
}

Remarks

To watch changes in all files, set the Filter property to an empty string (""). To watch a specific file, set the Filter property to the file name. For example, to watch for changes in the file MyDoc.txt, set the Filter property to "MyDoc.txt". You can also watch for changes in a certain type of file. For example, to watch for changes in any text files, set the Filter property to "*.txt". Use of multiple filters such as "*.txt|*.doc" is not supported.

The Filter property can be changed after the FileSystemWatcher object has started receiving events.

For more information about filtering out unwanted notifications, see the NotifyFilter, IncludeSubdirectories, and InternalBufferSize properties.

Filter accepts wildcards for matching files, as shown in the following examples.

Filter string	Watches the following files
*.*	All files (default). An empty string ("") also watches all files.
*.txt	All files with a "txt" extension.
*recipe.doc	All files ending in "recipe" with a "doc" extension.
win*.xml	All files beginning with "win" with an "xml" extension.
Sales*200?.xls	Matches the following: - Sales July 2001.xls - Sales Aug 2002.xls - Sales March 2004.xls but does not match: - Sales Nov 1999.xls
MyReport.Doc	Watches only MyReport.doc

Applies to

See also

• NotifyFilter
• IncludeSubdirectories
• InternalBufferSize