"Move will not work across volumes" - Why? And how to overcome?

Question

Why is it that File.Move(sourceFileName, destFileName) works fine when the source file and destination files are in different partitions, but Directory.Move(sourceDirName, destDirName) don't? It throws

System.IO.IOException: "Source and destination path must have identical roots. Move will not work across volumes."

I even tried to create a DirectoryInfo instance and use the MoveTo(destDirName) method but without success.

Am I missing something? Do I really have to implement a "move" functionality myself? (the directory I want to move is very large btw).

Its because it uses this native API: https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/aa365239%28v=vs.85%29.aspx ***The one caveat is that the MoveFile function will fail on directory moves when the destination is on a different volume.*** I would `Process.Start` XCopy and redirect standard output to monitor the process, especially with large directories. — Ron Beyer, May 04 '15 at 03:07
I see it as a probable implementation oversight that `File.Move` does work, but `Directory.Move` doesn't. — Marc.2377, Jul 19 '19 at 07:09

score 13 · Answer 1 · edited May 18 '15 at 07:20

13

You should Use Copy Function followed by a remove. As Move only works in the same drive. Directory.Move has a condition that states that :

IO Exception will be thrown if an attempt was made to move a directory to a different volume.

edited May 18 '15 at 07:20

Ehsan Sajjad

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answered May 04 '15 at 03:07

Ehsan

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Suppose you don't want to change the directory's creation date. – Kyle Delaney Jul 14 '17 at 22:07
4

Also, your `Copy` link is broken. Was there a `Directory.Copy` function at some point? – Kyle Delaney Jul 15 '17 at 00:46

score 6 · Answer 2 · answered Jul 14 '16 at 08:54

6

Another option is, to add a reference to the Microsoft.VisualBasic namespace and use the MoveDirectory method, which can move across volumes.

Microsoft.VisualBasic.FileIO.FileSystem.MoveDirectory(sourceDirName, destDirName);

answered Jul 14 '16 at 08:54

NePh

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I tried it and it didn't preserve the creation date, so I'm guessing it's still doing a copy/delete behind the scenes. – Kyle Delaney Jul 14 '17 at 22:59

score 3 · Answer 3 · answered Oct 29 '17 at 06:07

3

Although this is not a Vb.Net question but I found no one mentioned this method so I think might help... Only you need to convert it to C# if needed.

Code:

My.Computer.FileSystem.MoveDirectory(SrcDir,DestDir)

This works on different volume seamlessly/ per my experience.

answered Oct 29 '17 at 06:07

Mohammed Julfikar Ali Mahbub

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This was the simplest and best solution in my opinion. Thanks for sharing. – Mousa Alfhaily Feb 01 '18 at 15:55
@MousaAlfhaily you are welcome and I am happy it helped you :) – Mohammed Julfikar Ali Mahbub Feb 03 '18 at 07:16
1

Very very very thanks! I was struggling with this since weeks thinking on how to move across drives. This was the easiest and worked perfectly! Thanks a million. I wish I could upvote for this answer `n` number of times. Sad that I could do it only once – Priya Apr 07 '22 at 15:19
@Priya I am glad it helped you. And thank you so much for the kind words, means a lot! - `Happy Coding!` – Mohammed Julfikar Ali Mahbub Apr 08 '22 at 18:03

score 3 · Answer 4 · answered Feb 16 '18 at 11:06

Based on the posts "Copy a directory to a different drive" and "Non-recursive way to get all files in a directory and its subdirectories in Java", I wrote this non-recursive method and it works fine:

public static void Move(string source, string target)
    {
        if (!Directory.Exists(source))
        {
            throw new System.IO.DirectoryNotFoundException("Source directory couldn't be found.");
        }

        if (Directory.Exists(target))
        {
            throw new System.IO.IOException("Target directory already exists.");
        }

        DirectoryInfo sourceInfo = Directory.CreateDirectory(source);
        DirectoryInfo targetInfo = Directory.CreateDirectory(target);

        if (sourceInfo.FullName == targetInfo.FullName)
        {
            throw new System.IO.IOException("Source and target directories are the same.");
        }

        Stack<DirectoryInfo> sourceDirectories = new Stack<DirectoryInfo>();
        sourceDirectories.Push(sourceInfo);

        Stack<DirectoryInfo> targetDirectories = new Stack<DirectoryInfo>();
        targetDirectories.Push(targetInfo);

        while (sourceDirectories.Count > 0)
        {
            DirectoryInfo sourceDirectory = sourceDirectories.Pop();
            DirectoryInfo targetDirectory = targetDirectories.Pop();

            foreach (FileInfo file in sourceDirectory.GetFiles())
            {
                file.CopyTo(Path.Combine(targetDirectory.FullName, file.Name), overwrite: true);
            }

            foreach(DirectoryInfo subDirectory in sourceDirectory.GetDirectories())
            {
                sourceDirectories.Push(subDirectory);
                targetDirectories.Push(targetDirectory.CreateSubdirectory(subDirectory.Name));
            }
        }

        sourceInfo.Delete(true);
    }

Beautiful work there. Works out of the box, but had to comment the ```if (Directory.Exists(target)) { throw new System.IO.IOException("Target directory already exists."); }``` in my case — Egil Sandfeld, Aug 12 '22 at 09:25

score 2 · Accepted Answer · answered May 04 '15 at 03:10

2

You can also p/invoke SHFileOperation which is the same function Windows Explorer uses to move directories around. It will either perform a true move or recursive-copy-then-delete, as appropriate.

It can also show the same progress UI as explorer, just by setting a flag.

answered May 04 '15 at 03:10

Ben Voigt

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@firsttimer: pinvoke.net is great for calling Win32 APIs: http://pinvoke.net/default.aspx/shell32/SHFileOperation.html – Ben Voigt May 04 '15 at 03:20
Thanks. I'm giving it a try. – first timer May 04 '15 at 03:26
This seems to preserve the creation date when I move from C: to a USB stick, but then it uses a new date when I move from a USB stick to the C: drive. Do you know why? – Kyle Delaney Jul 14 '17 at 23:24
@KyleDelaney is the USB drive using the same filesystem as the C: drive? – Marc.2377 Jul 19 '19 at 21:54
@Marc.2377 - I have no way of checking a USB stick from 2 years ago – Kyle Delaney Jul 19 '19 at 23:54

score 1 · Answer 6 · answered Jun 20 '18 at 14:13

1

I know this post is a little old... but there is a way around this! Don't try and move the directory, but zip it up and move it as a File.Move(src,dest); and you can then extract it and there you have it!

answered Jun 20 '18 at 14:13

Alex

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It is unlikely you will end up getting any votes for this suggestion. This answer already has an accepted answer. Your proposed solution has the same issues as other answers but with more complexity – brianfeucht Jun 20 '18 at 15:13
+1 because the directory creation dates are preserved using this approach. At least when tested using 7z. – 2b77bee6-5445-4c77-b1eb-4df3e5 Sep 21 '18 at 13:02

score 0 · Answer 7 · answered Sep 27 '19 at 14:25

I had same problem in VB.NET and instead of "Directory.Move" I used MoveFolder with "FileSystemObject". You can preserve creation dates with this method.

Scripting.FileSystemObject oFSO = new Scripting.FileSystemObject();
oFSO.MoveFolder(sourceDirName, destDirName)

score 0 · Answer 8 · answered Jun 12 '21 at 06:13

i have this problem to and i like to solve it in this way

 string startPath = @".\start";
        string zipPath = @".\result.zip";
        string extractPath = @".\extract";

        ZipFile.CreateFromDirectory(startPath, zipPath);

        ZipFile.ExtractToDirectory(zipPath, extractPath);

"Move will not work across volumes" - Why? And how to overcome?

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