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windowswinapidirectorysystem

Is MAX_PATH enough to hold the path from GetSystemDirectory()?

From my understanding, that path will be a single-letter (the driver), followed by "\WINDOWS\SYSTEM32" so that MAX_PATH is more than enough to hold that path filled by GetSystemDirectory(). So it's safe to do:

TCHAR dir[MAX_PATH] = {0};
if(GetSystemDirectory(dir, sizeof(dir) / sizeof(*dir)) == 0) {
  // check for GetLastError()
}

Or am I missing something?

Solution

  • The documentation provided for the recommended alternative to GetSystemDirectory (which is ShGetFolderPath) says the following about its pszPath parameter:

    A pointer to a null-terminated string of length MAX_PATH which will receive the path. If an error occurs or S_FALSE is returned, this string will be empty. The returned path does not include a trailing backslash. For example, "C:\Users" is returned rather than "C:\Users\".

    So, yes, MAX_PATH will be a big enough buffer size.