使用JFileChooser获取工作目录

Question

There is a JFileChooser dialog where a user browse to a location which contains its config file. I want to get that location as the working directory however, System.getProperty("user.dir") seems to point to the location where the application starts. How can I fix that?

Assume

 D:\netbean\projects\test

that is where the application start. Then the user clicks on a button and browse to

 D:\configs

The code look like

File selectedFile = fc.getSelectedFile();
myTextArea.setText("Working directory is " + System.getProperty("user.dir") + "\n" );

That points to netbeans folder which is wrong in my case.

Answer 1

System.getProperty("user.dir") is a system property defined at runtime that is the directory where the JVM was run from.
It has no relation with the directory that contains the file chosen in a JFileChooser .

You can use the getParentFile() method of File to retrieve the folder that contains the file that was chosen by the user:

File selectedFile = fc.getSelectedFile();
myTextArea.setText("Parent directory is " + selectedFile.getParentFile() + "\n" );