Question

Run a file (e.g. a document) from memory

Asked by: Mortaza_doulaty

I've some data in memory (arrays of bytes), these are some images, word files and etc.

I want to run them without writing them to the hard disk.

According to http://www.codeproject.com/KB/cs/LoadExeIntoAssembly.aspx , I can run an exe file from memory, but I am trying to find a way for other file types.

(I know that this can be done simple by saving the file to the disk, then execute the file using a process, but I do not want to write the file to disk)

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Asked On
2009-01-03 at 03:47:50ID24022276
Tags

C#

,

.NET 3.5

,

run proccess from memory

Topics

Microsoft Visual C#.Net

,

.NET

,

C / C++ / C# Editors and IDEs

Participating Experts
2
Points
500
Comments
3

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Answers

 

by: TiggeritoPosted on 2009-01-03 at 06:03:55ID: 23285246

What do you actually want to do with the images, word files etc.

You don't actually run documents. You would run an executable that can do something with a document. e.g. you would run Microsoft Word to edit a word document.

When you execute the file using a process. it actually determines which executable to run based on the file type then starts it with the file as an argument.

I think the simplest solution would be to save the file and use the Process method. It would be quite complex to write your own code to determine the files default executable, run it, then stream in the files data (where possible).

Maybe not so bad if you have only a few specific file types to support. You could display images directly in .Net and there is a Word library you can use to effectively run Word from within your application.


 

by: Mortaza_doulatyPosted on 2009-01-03 at 10:23:16ID: 23286329

>>I think the simplest solution would be to save the file and use the Process method.
As I stated before, this solution is not suitable.

>>Maybe not so bad if you have only a few specific file types to support. You could display images directly in .Net and there is a Word library you can use to effectively run Word from within your application.

I am not looking for an alternate way...

 

by: MrClyfarPosted on 2009-01-03 at 13:51:11ID: 23287205

Hi there.

I've had a think about this question, and done some research, but I don't see how what you're asking for can be achieved.

You can't avoid having to save the images, docs, etc to the hard disk first, and then opening them. The only options you have are:

1) Somehow taking advantage of memory mapped files and trying to solve your problem with those. Here's a link that might help - http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/vbinterop/thread/4d646af4-d303-4b49-be9c-e5e6ec96d368/

2) Use a third-party component for your .NET apps that allow you to view/edit files such as doc files, pdf's, etc.

You can quite easily create your own image viewer apps

Think about it this way - picking on doc files for the moment - for Microsoft Word to open a doc file and display its contents, it must load the file from the hard disk. There is no way to get Word to open a doc file from memory. The only way you could open the doc file from memory is to get a third-party component that might let you view doc files.

I can understand why you would like to be able to do this, perhaps for performance?, but unfortunately it's not that easy to implement. You're stuck with having to create your own doc, image, etc file viewer/editors.

Cheers.
Jas.

20120131-EE-VQP-002

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