How do I discover the user's Desktop folder?

I'm making a little application in visual studio which loads a ROM in an emulator. I have two emulators and 20 ROMs.

I made a form and added a few buttons. When you click the Button it opens a new form and closes the old one.开发者_运维知识库 Then on the new form I have four buttons: each one loads a different ROM in an emulator. So when you press Button1 this code is triggered:

Private Sub Button1_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles yellow.Click
Shell("C:\Users\shifty\Desktop\pokemon games\Emulator\VBA\VisualBoyAdvance.exe ""C:\Users\shifty\Desktop\pokemon games\Roms\Yellow\Pokemon Yellow.gb""", vbNormalFocus)
End Sub

It works fine - I click it and it loads the game in the emulator. The bit im having trouble with is the file paths. If I send this application to a friend, it would still look for "C:\Users\shifty\Desktop\" - but that's on my computer, not his.

Is there a way to make the application look for the file on his computer (without changing the file path to (C:\Users\""his user name""\Desktop))

Environment.GetFolderPath(Environment.SpecialFolder.Desktop)

This will resolve to be the desktop folder for the current user.

It will even work between XP, vista and Windows 7 properly.

Old post but I have to side with Mc Shifty. You can't assume that everyone is a coding expert. If they were then they wouldn't be here asking questions like that.

None of the answers given above were complete

Environment.GetFolderPath(Environment.SpecialFolder.Desktop)) <<< includes and extra ) Environment.GetFolderPath(Environment.SpecialFolder.Desktop)); <<< extra ) and the ; is C or java not VB which he is obviously using by his example code.

Both of those only give you half of the required code to generate something usable.

Dim s As String = Environment.GetFolderPath(Environment.SpecialFolder.Desktop)

The above code will give you the result needed, c:\users\shifty\desktop

Private Sub Button1_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles yellow.Click
    Dim s As String = Environment.GetFolderPath(Environment.SpecialFolder.Desktop)
    Shell(s & "\Desktop\pokemon games\Emulator\VBA\VisualBoyAdvance.exe " & s & "\pokemon games\Roms\Yellow\Pokemon Yellow.gb""", vbNormalFocus)
End Sub

There's a mechanism to get the current user's Desktop directory, using Environment.SpecialFolder.

Usage:

Environment.GetFolderPath(Environment.SpecialFolder.Desktop));

I had problems using the Environment.GetFolderPath method from previous answers.

The following works in VB 2012, My.Computer.FileSystem.SpecialDirectories.Desktop

So, if you have a file on a users desktop named "contacts.txt", the following will display the full path,

' Desktop path
Dim desktopPath = My.Computer.FileSystem.SpecialDirectories.Desktop

' Concatenate desktop path and file name
filePath = desktopPath & "/contacts.txt"

MsgBox(filePath)

Documentation

Really old post at this point, but hey, found what I was looking for.

MC SH1FTY, I assume you have figured this out already, but to do what you are trying to do:

1) Call in that code that Spence wrote as a variable (I'd declare it Globally, but that's my preference. To do that:

Public userDesktopLoc As String = Environment.GetFolderPath(Environment.SpecialFolder.Desktop)

2) Either use this DIRECTLY in your code, or make another string to concatenate a directory:

Option A)

Public emulatorPath As String = userDesktopLoc & "pokemon games\Emulator\VBA\VisualBoyAdvance.exe "
Public romPath As String = userDesktopLoc & "pokemon games\Roms\Yellow\Pokemon Yellow.gb"

Then, within your Subroutine, replace your current Shell statement with:

Shell(emulatorPath & romPath, vbNormalFocus)

Or, Option B, which is thedsz's answer:

    Private Sub Button1_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles yellow.Click
        Dim s As String = Environment.GetFolderPath(Environment.SpecialFolder.Desktop)
        Shell(s & "\Desktop\pokemon games\Emulator\VBA\VisualBoyAdvance.exe " & s & "\pokemon games\Roms\Yellow\Pokemon Yellow.gb""", vbNormalFocus) 
End Sub

By using that you guarantee that the emulator is on the users desktop. This is not always the case. I know I move things around that I download or a friend sends to me. It's better to use App.Path and make sure your emulator.exe is in the directory with your little front end program (usually the case).

the answer is simple.

• put this at the top of the form
• "Public thepath As String = Environment.GetFolderPath(Environment.SpecialFolder.Desktop)"
• that ensures that the file is on their desktop!
• then" click on your button or whatever you used to open the emu and type
• "Process.Start(thepath + "the emulator.exe "+ "the rom you want")

You need to use a file open dialog to choose your path for the two files. Here is an example.

You then use the two paths in your code:

Private Sub Button1_Click(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles yellow.Click
    Shell(emulatorPath + "\"" + romPath + "\"", vbNormalFocus)
End Sub