What is the best way to read in a text file from the server in asp.net-mvc

Question

In one of my controller actions I need to read in a text file that has a bunch of reference data in it. Right now I simply put it in the "/Content" directory.

My questions are:

1. Is this the "right" place to put this file or should I put it in another directory?
2. What is the best way to read in a text file in asp.net-mvc that is sitting on the server?

• Marc Gravell: "right" depends on a lot of things; size, nature, how often it is updated, etc
• rahularyansharma: use this library easy to implemet in asp.net filehelpers.com
• user156888: really. use a library to read a text file?!

Answer 1

If the file should not be directly available via URL, you should put it in App_Data.

For reading it, just use:

var fileContents = System.IO.File.ReadAllText(Server.MapPath(@"~/App_Data/file.txt"));

• mare: if the file should be available for public put it in the Content or Upload (if uploaded) folders
• Hong: Thank you for the tip. HostingEnvironment.MapPath(@"~/App_Data/file.txt") works too if Server is not easy to come by.
• Mike de Klerk: Doesn't work for me because this results includes the routing of the url.
• Hossein Narimani Rad: Doesn't work for me when I publish the project to server, but in debug mode using HostingEnvironment.MapPath works
• DtechNet: Is there any architectural concerns for just creating a ViewBag.Property in the cshtml file itself or should this file content be served from the Controller? I have several files with static text for certain pages (poor man CMS) and I don't think it'd be a good fit for a database because the data will rarely EVER change.

Answer 2

Ok this way it works for me (VS2017)

1. Set the Build Action of the file.txt to Content
2. Check if Copy to output directory is not set to 'Do not copy'

3. Use HostingEnvironment.MapPath(@"~/App_Data/file.txt") (thanks to Hong comment)

   var fileContents = 
    System.IO.File.ReadAllText(HostingEnvironment.MapPath(@"~/App_Data/file.txt"));
   

• user585968: This seems to be the answer for 2017+