Common Dialog Control: Huh?

Greetings,

I'd like to be able to select multiple files with my open common dialog control in my app, but when using the cdlOFNAllowMultiselect

flag, the reference states:

"...the FileName property returns a string containing the names of all selected files. The names in the string are delimited by spaces"

Huh? Spaces? Why the heck would Microsoft seperate filenames with spaces when clearly any number of spaces can be found within filenames themselves?

Is there an easy way of figuring out how many files and extracting them from the FileName property? A filename count perhaps? Or is there possibly a newer Common Dialog control (or if someone made one) that delmits multiple filenames with a different, more suitable character?

Thanks,
Aienthiwan

If you use the cdlOFNAllowMultiSelect flag only, you will get the old (3.1) style open dialog that supports only 8.3 format filenames, so they are separated by spaces, no problem.

But in your application, you will invariably use the cdlOFNExplorer flag too. And in this case, the filenames, though they are shown delimited by double quotes with spaces in between, are returned delimited by the NULL character,a nd this causes problems.

Here is a code (adapted from MSDN) that will separate the names for you:


option Explicit

private Sub Command1_Click()
Dim s as string, FileArray() as string
Dim MyString as string, Path as string, Filename as string
Dim J as Integer, I as Integer

ReDim FileArray(1)
CommonDialog1.Flags = cdlOFNAllowMultiselect Or cdlOFNExplorer
CommonDialog1.ShowOpen
s = Chr(0)
MyString = CommonDialog1.Filename

If InStr(1, MyString, s) > 0 then
If (InStr(MyString, "\") + 1) = InStr(MyString, s) then
Path = Trim(Left$(MyString, InStr(1, MyString, s) - 1))
else
Path = Trim(Left$(MyString, InStr(1, MyString, s) - 1)) & "\"
End If
Filename = Right$(MyString, len(MyString) _
- InStr(1, MyString, s))
MyString = Filename
J = 0

for I = 1 to len(Filename)
If mid$(Filename, I, 1) = s then
J = J + 1
End If
next
J = J + 1
ReDim FileArray(1 to J) as string
for I = 1 to UBound(FileArray)
If I < UBound(FileArray) then
Filename = Trim(Left$(MyString, InStr(1, MyString, s) - 1))
MyString = Trim(Right$(MyString, len(MyString) - InStr(1, MyString, s)))
else
Filename = MyString
End If
FileArray(I) = Filename
MsgBox Filename
next
else
for I = 1 to len(MyString)
If mid$(MyString, I, 1) = "\" then
Path = Left$(MyString, I)
Filename = Right$(MyString, len(MyString) - I)
End If
next
FileArray(UBound(FileArray)) = Filename
End If

End Sub

Excellent!

Thank you, you hit the problem right on the head.

Aienthiwan