Missing .net 4.5 property in PortableLibrary code

Question

I'm writing a Windows Phone framework with Windows 8 in mind. That means I'm creating a Portable Class Library (PCL) to be used in both platforms.

Right now my PCL is targeting .NET 4.5, Windows Phone 8 and Windows Store apps, as you can see in the project properties.

In that project I need to use Path.DirectorySeparatorChar but I get the following error from the compiler:
System.IO.Path' does not contain a definition for 'DirectorySeparatorChar'

I understand that that particular char might be different in the different targeted OS (I really don't know if they are) but why is the compiler complaining about it? I mean, the property help doc says it is supported by .net framework 4.5, am I targeting the right framework? Is the PCL really targeting the full .net framework 4.5?

Answer 1

With respect to Path.DirectorySeparatorChar:

As far as I remember we've removed it from Windows Store in order to discourage manual parsing of paths. In general you should use Path.Combine() for assembling paths and Path.GetDirectoryName() for splitting them up. In order to check for invalid chars, there is another method that allows retrieving those.

So practically speaking, what do you need the property for?

Update: To answer your original question around understanding profiles: The profiles represent API intersections between the platforms you've selected in the PCL dialog. Generally speaking, the fewer platforms you target and the more recent the versions, the more APIs you get. Checking all platforms in the oldest version basically gives you the lowest common denominator.

Since you've targeted .NET 4.5 and .NET Windows Store, you can't access Path.DirectorySeparatorChar because that property isn't included in Windows Store.