How to reference an exe file stored in visual studio project resource when running cmd.exe using process.start()

Question

I am developing a C# windows form application project. The form contains a button and after the button click event cmd.exe is started using Process.Start() method. The StartInfo.Arguments() contains path to an exe file stored in the project resources folder (I have created a new folder called Resources and another subfolder called SW1. The exe file is inside SW1 folder)

Right now, the exe file is stored in a different location in local computer and I use the full path to refernce the exe file in StartInfo.Argument(). However, when i publish the C# application, I want the exe file will be bundled as a resource. How can I reference the exe file in this case?

private async void button1_Click(object sender, EventArgs e)
    {
        await RunCMDAsync();
    }

private async static Task RunCMDAsync()
    {


        try
        {
            using (Process myProcess = new Process())
            {
                ProcessStartInfo startInfo = new ProcessStartInfo();

                startInfo.FileName = "cmd.exe";

                startInfo.Arguments = @"/C cd <path to the exe file on my local computer here> & <name of exe --additional arguments>";

                startInfo.UseShellExecute = false;
                startInfo.RedirectStandardInput = true;                    
                myProcess.StartInfo = startInfo;
                myProcess.Start();                    
                myProcess.WaitForExit();
            }
        }
        catch(Exception ex)
        {
            Console.WriteLine(ex.Message);
        }


    }

In the above code, Whenever the cmd.exe process is started, I want to pass two arguments using StartInfo.Arguments()

startInfo.Arguments = @"/C cd <path to the exe file on my local computer here> & <name of exe --additional arguments>";

The first argument is to cd into the folder which contains the exe file ( /C cd <path to the exe file on my local computer here> )

The second argument runs the exe file with some parameters ( <name of exe --additional arguments> )

How can I reference the exe file in Resources > SW1 folder after I publish this as a standalone application? Do I need to extract the exe file to a location on the target computer during installing the C# application and use the same code as above or is there a way to directly reference resources folder?

Answer 1

If what you need is to find the directory where your program is running (I'm not sure I understood your problem) then use System.AppDomain.CurrentDomain.BaseDirectory .

string exePath = System.AppDomain.CurrentDomain.BaseDirectory +
 "Resources\\SW1\\" + exefilenameWithExtension;