How to enumerate files on a Windows CE based device from the Desktop

In this article I'd like to demonstrate how to enumerate files on a Windows CE based device from the desktop.

Listing the contents of a directly on a Windows CE from the desktop is something I found to be useful every now and then. It involves using the Remote API and ActiveSync / Windows Mobile Device Center

As usual this will involve a few P/Invokes:

[DllImport("rapi.dll", CharSet = CharSet.Unicode)]

static extern int CeRapiInit();

[DllImport("rapi.dll", CharSet = CharSet.Unicode)]

static extern int CeRapiUninit();

[DllImport("rapi.dll", CharSet = CharSet.Unicode)]

static extern IntPtr CeFindFirstFile(string lpFileName, ref CE_FIND_DATA lpFindFileData);

[DllImport("rapi.dll", CharSet = CharSet.Unicode)]

static extern bool CeFindNextFile(IntPtr hFindFile, ref CE_FIND_DATA lpFindFileData);

[DllImport("rapi.dll", CharSet = CharSet.Unicode)]

static extern bool CeFindClose(IntPtr hFindFile);

We also need the CE_FIND_DATA structure

[StructLayout(LayoutKind.Sequential, CharSet = CharSet.Unicode)]

struct CE_FIND_DATA

{

    public int dwFileAttributes;

    public FILETIME ftCreationTime;

    public FILETIME ftLastAccessTime;

    public FILETIME ftLastWriteTime;

    public int nFileSizeHigh;

    public int nFileSizeLow;

    public int dwOID;

    [MarshalAs(UnmanagedType.ByValTStr, SizeConst = 260)]

    public string cFileName;

};

[StructLayout(LayoutKind.Sequential)]

struct FILETIME

{

    public int dwLowDateTime;

    public int dwHighDateTime;

}

The CeRapiInit method has be always called before performing Remote API operations. Once done, the CeRapiUninit must be called. For listing the files in a directory, I use CeFindFirstFile, CeFindNextFile, and CeFindClose. How this works: If the file(s) exists CeFindFirstFile will return a valid handle that can be used for calling CeFindNextFile. After going through all the files CeFindNextFile will return false and a call to CeFindClose needs to be called.

public static string[] GetFiles(string remoteDirectory)

{

    try

    {

        CeRapiInit();

        var list = new List<string>();

        var findData = new CE_FIND_DATA();

        var hFindFile = CeFindFirstFile(remoteDirectory + "\\*", ref findData);

        if (hFindFile != new IntPtr(-1))

        {

            try

            {

                do

                {

                    if (findData.dwFileAttributes != (int)FileAttributes.Directory)

                        list.Add(findData.cFileName);

                } while (CeFindNextFile(hFindFile, ref findData));

            }

            finally

            {

                CeFindClose(hFindFile);

            }

        }

        return list.ToArray();

    }

    finally

    {

        CeRapiUninit();

    }

}

I hope you found this useful.