Restricting access to certain folders with a FolderBrowserDialog

Question

I want to restrict what folder a person can choose to set their default save path in my app. Is there a class or method which would allow me to check access rights and either limit the user's options or show an error once they have made their selection. Is FileSystemSecurity.AccessRightType a possibility?

Answer 1

Since the FolderBrowserDialog is a rather closed control (it opens a modal dialog, does it stuff, and lets you know what the user picked), I don't think you're going to have much luck intercepting what the user can select or see. You could always make your own custom control, of course ;)

As for testing if they have access to a folder

private void OnHandlingSomeEvent(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
  DialogResult result = folderBrowserDialog1.ShowDialog();
  if(result == DialogResult.OK)
  {
      String folderPath = folderBrowserDialog1.SelectedPath;
      if (UserHasAccess(folderPath)) 
      {
        // yay! you'd obviously do something for the else part here too...
      }
  }
}

private bool UserHasAccess(String folderPath)
{
  try
  {
    // Attempt to get a list of security permissions from the folder. 
    // This will raise an exception if the path is read only or do not have access to view the permissions. 
    System.Security.AccessControl.DirectorySecurity ds =
      System.IO.Directory.GetAccessControl(folderPath);
    return true;
  }
  catch (UnauthorizedAccessException)
  {
    return false;
  }
}

I should note that the UserHasAccess function stuff was obtained from this other StackOverflow question.