FileSystemInfo.CreationTimeUtc Property (System.IO)

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Microsoft Visual Studio 2010/.NET Framework 4

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.NET Framework Class Library

FileSystemInfo..::.CreationTimeUtc Property

Updated: May 2010

Gets or sets the creation time, in coordinated universal time (UTC), of the current file or directory.

Namespace: System.IO
Assembly: mscorlib (in mscorlib.dll)

Syntax

Visual Basic

<ComVisibleAttribute(False)> _
Public Property CreationTimeUtc As DateTime

[ComVisibleAttribute(false)]
public DateTime CreationTimeUtc { get; set; }

Visual C++

[ComVisibleAttribute(false)]
public:
property DateTime CreationTimeUtc {
    DateTime get ();
    void set (DateTime value);
}

[<ComVisibleAttribute(false)>]
member CreationTimeUtc : DateTime with get, set

Property Value

Type: System..::.DateTime
The creation date and time in UTC format of the current FileSystemInfo object.

Exceptions

Exception	Condition
IOException	Refresh cannot initialize the data.
DirectoryNotFoundException	The specified path is invalid; for example, it is on an unmapped drive.
PlatformNotSupportedException	The current operating system is not Windows NT or later.
ArgumentOutOfRangeException	The caller attempts to set an invalid access time.

Remarks

Note This method may return an inaccurate value, because it uses native functions whose values may not be continuously updated by the operating system.

The value of the CreationTimeUtc property is pre-cached if the current instance of the FileSystemInfo object was returned from any of the following DirectoryInfo methods:

To get the latest value, call the Refresh method.

If the file described in the FileSystemInfo object does not exist, this property will return 12:00 midnight, January 1, 1601 A.D. (C.E.) Coordinated Universal Time (UTC).

NTFS-formatted drives may cache file meta-info, such as file creation time, for a short period of time. This process is known as file tunneling. As a result, it may be necessary to explicitly set the creation time of a file if you are overwriting or replacing an existing file.

This property value is nullNothingnullptra null reference (Nothing in Visual Basic) if the file system containing the FileSystemInfo object does not support this information.

Windows 95, Windows 98, Windows 98 Second Edition Platform Note: These operating systems do not support this property, and DirectoryInfo implementations of this property are not supported.

Version Information

.NET Framework

Supported in: 4, 3.5, 3.0, 2.0, 1.1

.NET Framework Client Profile

Supported in: 4, 3.5 SP1

.NET Framework Security

FileIOPermission
for setting the creation time. Associated enumeration: FileIOPermissionAccess..::.Write

Platforms

Windows 7, Windows Vista SP1 or later, Windows XP SP3, Windows XP SP2 x64 Edition, Windows Server 2008 (Server Core not supported), Windows Server 2008 R2 (Server Core supported with SP1 or later), Windows Server 2003 SP2

The .NET Framework does not support all versions of every platform. For a list of the supported versions, see .NET Framework System Requirements.

Reference

FileSystemInfo Class

System.IO Namespace

Other Resources

File and Stream I/O

How to: Read Text from a File

How to: Write Text to a File

Change History

Date	History	Reason
May 2010	Updated remarks.	Information enhancement.

Date

History

Reason

May 2010

Updated remarks.

Information enhancement.