How to get the application executable name in WindowsC++/CLI?

Question

I need to change the functionality of an application based on the executable name. Nothing huge, just changing strings that are displayed and some internal identifiers. The application is written in a mixture of native and .Net C++-CLI code.

Two ways that I have looked at are to parse the GetCommandLine() function in Win32 and stuffing around with the AppDomain and other things in .Net. However using GetCommandLine won't always work as when run from the debugger the command line is empty. And the .Net AppDomain stuff seems to require a lot of stuffing around.

So what is the nicest/simplest/most efficient way of determining the executable name in C++/CLI? (I'm kind of hoping that I've just missed something simple that is available in .Net.)

Edit: One thing that I should mention is that this is a Windows GUI application using C++/CLI, therefore there's no access to the traditional C style main function, it uses the Windows WinMain() function.

Answer 1

Call GetModuleFileName() using 0 as a module handle.

Note: you can also use the argv[0] parameter to main or call GetCommandLine() if there is no main. However, keep in mind that these methods will not necessarily give you the complete path to the executable file. They will give back the same string of characters that was used to start the program. Calling GetModuleFileName() will always give you a complete path & file name.

Answer 2

Ferruccio's answer is good. Here's some example code:

TCHAR exepath[MAX_PATH+1];

if(0 == GetModuleFileName(0, exepath, MAX_PATH+1))
    MessageBox(_T("Error!"));

MessageBox(exepath, _T("My executable name"));

Answer 3

Use the argv argument to main:

int main(int argc, char* argv[])
{
    printf("%s\n", argv[0]);  //argv[0] will contain the name of the app.
    return 0;
}

You may need to scan the string to remove directory information and/or extensions, but the name will be there.

Answer 4

Use __argv[0]

Answer 5

There is a static Method on Assembly that will get it for you in .NET.

Assembly.GetEntryAssembly().FullName

Edit: I didn't realize that you wanted the file name... you can also get that by calling:

Assembly.GetEntryAssembly().CodeBase

That will get you the full path to the assembly (including the file name).

Answer 6

I can confirm it works under win64/visual studio 2017/ MFC

TCHAR szFileName[MAX_PATH + 1];
GetModuleFileName(NULL, szFileName, MAX_PATH + 1);
auto exe = CString(szFileName);

exe contains full path to exe.