How to get the newest (last modified) directory [C#]

Question

Currently my application uses string[] subdirs = Directory.GetDirectories(path) to get the list of subdirectories, and now I want to extract the path to the latest (last modified) subdirectory in the list.

What is the easiest way to accomplish this? (efficiency is not a major concern - but robustness is)

Answer 1

Non-recursive:

new DirectoryInfo(path).GetDirectories()
                       .OrderByDescending(d=>d.LastWriteTimeUtc).First();

Recursive:

new DirectoryInfo(path).GetDirectories("*", 
    SearchOption.AllDirectories).OrderByDescending(d=>d.LastWriteTimeUtc).First();

Answer 2

without using LINQ

DateTime lastHigh = new DateTime(1900,1,1);
string highDir;
foreach (string subdir in Directory.GetDirectories(path)){
    DirectoryInfo fi1 = new DirectoryInfo(subdir);
    DateTime created = fi1.LastWriteTime;

    if (created > lastHigh){
        highDir = subdir;
        lastHigh = created;
    }
}

Answer 3

Try this:

string pattern = "*.txt"

var dirInfo = new DirectoryInfo(directory);

var file = (from f in dirInfo.GetFiles(pattern) 
            orderby f.LastWriteTime descending 
            select f).First();

http://zamirsblog.blogspot.com/2012/07/c-find-most-recent-file-in-directory.html