A Simple Class to Read and Write INI Files

• Download source files - 3.36 KB
• Download demo project - 20.47 KB

Introduction

This is a further exploration if the INI file class theme started by Xiangxiong Jian (xiaohe521) and Adam (aejw) on The Code Project. The main idea remains pretty much the same: the class is a thin wrapper around Win32 API for reading/writing INI files. However, I was trying to gear my class more towards the MFC.

This class may be useful if your application needs to access both registry and INI file, or multiple INI files. Otherwise, you could use AfxGetApp()->m_pszProfileName and AfxGetApp()->GetProfileXXXX(…).

Class Declaration

class CIniFile : public CObject
{
public:
 CIniFile(LPCTSTR lpIniFileName, INT iMaxStringLength);
 virtual ~CIniFile();

// Attributes
protected:
 CString  m_strFileName; 	// path to the INI file
 const INT m_MAXSTRLEN; 	// max length of a string (excluding the key name)
                        	//that can be written/read to/from the
                        	// INI file by this instance

// Operations
public:
 CString GetIniFileName();
 void SetIniFileName(LPCTSTR lpIniFileName);
 BOOL GetStatus(CFileStatus& rStatus);

 void GetString(LPCTSTR lpSection, LPCTSTR lpKey, 
		CString& strRet, LPCTSTR strDefault);
 UINT GetInt(LPCTSTR lpSection, LPCTSTR lpKey, INT iDefaultValue); 
 FLOAT GetFloat(LPCTSTR lpSection, LPCTSTR lpKey, FLOAT fDefaultValue);
 BOOL GetStruct(LPCTSTR lpSection, LPCTSTR lpKey, 
		LPVOID lpRetStruct, UINT iSizeStruct);
 void GetSectionNames(CStringList& lstSectionNames);

 BOOL WriteSection(LPCTSTR lpSection, LPCTSTR lpData); 
 BOOL WriteString(LPCTSTR lpSection, LPCTSTR lpKey, LPCTSTR lpString);
 BOOL WriteNumber(LPCTSTR lpSection, LPCTSTR lpKey, INT iValue);
 BOOL WriteNumber(LPCTSTR lpSection, LPCTSTR lpKey, FLOAT fValue);
 BOOL WriteStruct(LPCTSTR lpSection, LPCTSTR lpKey, 
		LPVOID lpStruct, UINT iSizeStruct);

 BOOL RemoveKey(LPCTSTR lpSection, LPCTSTR lpKey); 
};

Class Implementation

The implementation is very straightforward. It’s based on the following API functions:

• GetPrivateProfileSectionNames
• GetPrivateProfileStruct
• GetPrivateProfileString
• GetPrivateProfileInt
• WritePrivateProfileStruct
• WritePrivateProfileString
• WritePrivateProfileSection

Download the source code for details (it's fairly well commented).

Demo Application / Test Bed

Here’s the console application that exercises the methods of the class. The output goes to the afxDump.

// just a dummy structure to write/read to/from the INI file
struct TestStruct : public POINT
{
 char charr[8];
};

// PURPOSE: test bed for the INI file class
void TestIniClass()
{
 CIniFile iniFile(".\\test1.ini", 1024);
 iniFile.SetIniFileName(".\\test2.ini");     		// change the file name 
					 // after the class has bee created

 // test the writing to the INI file
 iniFile.WriteSection("section1", "key1=test1\x000key2=test2"); // make a section 
							// with 2 new keys
 iniFile.WriteSection("section2", "key1=test1");   	// make another section
 iniFile.WriteString("section1", "key3", "test3");  	// create a new key
 iniFile.WriteString("section1", "key2", "test4");  	// update an existing key
 iniFile.WriteString("section1", "key1", NULL);   	// remove an existing key
 iniFile.RemoveKey("section1", "key3");     		// remove another existing key
 iniFile.WriteNumber("section1", "key4", 123);   	// write an integer 
						// to a new key
 iniFile.WriteNumber("section1", "key5", -123);   	// write a negative integer 
						// to a new key
 iniFile.WriteNumber("section1", "key6", -123.456f);  	// write a float to a new key
 TestStruct writeTestStruct;
 writeTestStruct.x = 6;
 writeTestStruct.y = 7;
 strcpy(writeTestStruct.charr, "abcdefg");
 iniFile.WriteStruct("section1", "key7", &writeTestStruct, sizeof(TestStruct));
 
 // Test the reading from the INI file
 CString str;           // string that will receive the output 
 iniFile.GetString("section1", "key2", str, "default"); TRACE("key2=%s\n", str);
 iniFile.GetString("section1", "nokey", str, "default"); 
	TRACE("nokey=%s\n", str); // non-existent key
 iniFile.GetString("section3", "key1", str, "default"); TRACE("nokey=%s\n", str);
 TRACE("key4=%d\n", iniFile.GetInt("section1", "key4", 0));
 TRACE("key5=%d\n", iniFile.GetInt("section1", "key5", 0));
 TRACE("key6=%f\n", iniFile.GetFloat("section1", "key6", 0));
 TestStruct readTestStruct;
 iniFile.GetStruct("section1", "key7", &readTestStruct, sizeof(TestStruct));
 TRACE("key7= %ld %ld %s\n", readTestStruct.x, 
	readTestStruct.y, readTestStruct.charr);

 // Test the section list retrieval
 CStringList lstSectionNames;
 iniFile.GetSectionNames(lstSectionNames); 
 TRACE("Sections:\n");
 for (POSITION pos = lstSectionNames.GetHeadPosition(); pos != NULL; )
 {
  TRACE("\t%s\n", lstSectionNames.GetNext(pos));
 }
}

Is there anything that should be fixed, added or removed in this project? Please let me know!

References

[1] A Small Class to Read INI File

[2] INI Class for .NET

[3] CIni

Revision History

This article, along with any associated source code and files, is licensed under The Code Project Open License (CPOL)