Select a file for renaming in SharpShell context menu

Question

I'm using SharpShell to write a tiny new shell context menu item that copies the currently selected files to a new subfolder, then prompts the user for the directory's new name .

Searching StackOverflow, I found this answer. However, I'd like to do the same in SharpShell.

I will somehow have to fire SVSI_EDIT at it, which I can find buried deep in SharpShell.Interop , but I'm not sure how any of this works. I can't find any documentation or code samples whatsoever.

(Edit: I think finding out how to get a Pidl from a file name would be a good start, but maybe I don't really need that at all?)

Answer 1

You can start creating a project with SharpShell to register a new shell context menu like in this tutorial .

Here, we have to define a class implementing SharpContextMenu . For simplicity we will create the menu for any filetype and always show it:

[ComVisible(true)]
[COMServerAssociation(AssociationType.AllFiles)]
public class CopyFilesExtension : SharpContextMenu
{
    protected override bool CanShowMenu()
    {
        return true;
    }

    protected override ContextMenuStrip CreateMenu()
    {
        var menu = new ContextMenuStrip();

        var copyFiles = new ToolStripMenuItem { Text = "Copy Files To Folder..." };

        copyFiles.Click += (sender, args) => CopyFiles();
        menu.Items.Add(copyFiles);

        return menu;
    }

    private void CopyFiles()
    {
        ...
    }
} 

But I'm sure you've done all this, the problem here is to implement the CopyFiles() method.

One way to do this is showing a dialog asking for the name of the folder, something like this:

Then, implement CopyFiles() like so:

private void CopyFiles()
{
    using (var dialog = new CopyFileDialog())
    {
        if (dialog.ShowDialog() == DialogResult.OK)
        {
            var folder = Path.GetDirectoryName(SelectedItemPaths.First());
            var newFolder = Path.Combine(folder, dialog.FolderName);

            Directory.CreateDirectory(newFolder);

            foreach (var path in SelectedItemPaths)
            {
                var newPath = Path.Combine(newFolder, Path.GetFileName(path));
                File.Move(path, newPath);
            }
        }
    }
}

In above code, we asked for the name of the folder, then create the folder and finally move selected files to that folder.

However , if you want to do it using Rename command in Windows Explorer we can start by importing some needed Win32 functions:

class Win32
{
    [DllImport("shell32.dll", CharSet = CharSet.Unicode)]
    public static extern IntPtr ILCreateFromPath([In, MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.LPWStr)] string pszPath);

    [DllImport("shell32.dll")]
    public static extern int SHOpenFolderAndSelectItems(IntPtr pidlFolder, uint cidl, IntPtr[] apidl, int dwFlags);

    [DllImport("shell32.dll")]
    public static extern void ILFree(IntPtr pidl);
}

• ILCreateFromPath allows us get the PIDL from a filename.
• SHOpenFolderAndSelectItems allow us select the file and send rename command.
• ILFree frees unmanaged PIDL created.

With these Win32 functions we can defines CopyFiles() as follows:

private void CopyFiles()
{
    var folder = Path.GetDirectoryName(SelectedItemPaths.First());
    var newFolder = Path.Combine(folder, "New Folder");
    Directory.CreateDirectory(newFolder);

    foreach (var path in SelectedItemPaths)
    {
        var newPath = Path.Combine(newFolder, Path.GetFileName(path));
        File.Move(path, newPath);
    }

    RenameInExplorer(newFolder);
}


private static void RenameInExplorer(string itemPath)
{
    IntPtr folder = Win32.ILCreateFromPath(Path.GetDirectoryName(itemPath));
    IntPtr file = Win32.ILCreateFromPath(itemPath);

    try
    {
        Win32.SHOpenFolderAndSelectItems(folder, 1, new[] { file }, 1);
    }
    finally
    {
        Win32.ILFree(folder);
        Win32.ILFree(file);
    }
}

We can't use SharpShell.Interop.Shell32 since the only method available in this class is ShellExecuteEx() which is used to launch new processes.

Answer 2

Using the SelectItemInExplorer functionality from the cited example in the question, a very basic implementation would look like the following. Where possible any P/Invoke functionality was rewritten to use as much of SharpShell's existing declarations as possible.

using SharpShell.Attributes;
using SharpShell.Interop;
using SharpShell.SharpContextMenu;
using System;
using System.IO;
using System.Linq;
using System.Runtime.InteropServices;
using System.Windows.Forms;

namespace SendToFolderRename
{
    [ComVisible(true)]
    [COMServerAssociation(AssociationType.AllFiles)]
    public class SendToFolderRename : SharpContextMenu
    {
        [DllImport("ole32.dll")]
        private static extern int CreateBindCtx(int reserved, out IntPtr ppbc);

        [DllImport("shell32.dll")]
        private static extern int SHOpenFolderAndSelectItems(IntPtr pidlFolder, uint cidl, IntPtr[] apidl, int dwFlags);

        protected override bool CanShowMenu()
        {
            return true;
        }

        protected override ContextMenuStrip CreateMenu()
        {
            var menu = new ContextMenuStrip();
            var itemCountLines = new ToolStripMenuItem
            {
                Text = "Copy files to subfolder"
            };

            itemCountLines.Click += CopyFilesToSubfolder;
            menu.Items.Add(itemCountLines);
            return menu;
        }

        private void CopyFilesToSubfolder(object sender, EventArgs e)
        {
            //System.Diagnostics.Debugger.Break();
            string firstSelectedFile = SelectedItemPaths.FirstOrDefault();

            if (string.IsNullOrEmpty(firstSelectedFile))
                return;

            string currentDirPath = (new FileInfo(firstSelectedFile)).DirectoryName;
            string newDirName = Path.GetRandomFileName();
            string newDirPath = Path.Combine(currentDirPath, newDirName);
            DirectoryInfo newDir = Directory.CreateDirectory(newDirPath);
            foreach (string filePath in SelectedItemPaths)
            {
                FileInfo fileInfo = new FileInfo(filePath);
                string newFilePath = Path.Combine(fileInfo.DirectoryName, newDirName, fileInfo.Name);
                File.Copy(filePath, newFilePath);
            }

            SelectItemInExplorer(IntPtr.Zero, newDirPath, true);
        }

        public static void SelectItemInExplorer(IntPtr hwnd, string itemPath, bool edit)
        {
            if (itemPath == null)
                throw new ArgumentNullException("itemPath");

            IntPtr folder = PathToAbsolutePIDL(hwnd, Path.GetDirectoryName(itemPath));
            IntPtr file = PathToAbsolutePIDL(hwnd, itemPath);
            try
            {
                SHOpenFolderAndSelectItems(folder, 1, new[] { file }, edit ? 1 : 0);
            }
            finally
            {
                Shell32.ILFree(folder);
                Shell32.ILFree(file);
            }
        }

        private static IntPtr GetShellFolderChildrenRelativePIDL(IntPtr hwnd, IShellFolder parentFolder, string displayName)
        {
            IntPtr bindCtx;
            CreateBindCtx(0, out bindCtx);

            uint pchEaten = 0;
            SFGAO pdwAttributes = 0;
            IntPtr ppidl;
            parentFolder.ParseDisplayName(hwnd, bindCtx, displayName, ref pchEaten, out ppidl, ref pdwAttributes);
            return ppidl;
        }

        private static IntPtr PathToAbsolutePIDL(IntPtr hwnd, string path)
        {
            IShellFolder desktopFolder;
            Shell32.SHGetDesktopFolder(out desktopFolder);
            return GetShellFolderChildrenRelativePIDL(hwnd, desktopFolder, path);
        }
    }
}