How to open a file from the project in a native C++ unit test (Visual Studio)?

Question

I have a native C++ unit test project in Visual Studio (2012).
In one of my tests I would like to read a file included in my unit test project. Is it possible? What properties of the file should I set and what path should I use?

I added a test.txt file to my project (and tried to set its Content property to true). And in a unit test I tried to open the file with a relative path like this:

std::ifstream file("text.txt");

But it does not work.

I guess the file should be copied to the place from where the unit test runs. Is there a simple solution for this?

Answer 1

This can be accomplished by using the __FILE__ macro, in my case I did like this:

//Returns my solution's directory
#define TEST_CASE_DIRECTORY GetDirectoryName(__FILE__)

string GetDirectoryName(string path){
    const size_t last_slash_idx = path.rfind('\\');
    if (std::string::npos != last_slash_idx)
    {
        return path.substr(0, last_slash_idx + 1);
    }
    return "";
}

TEST_METHOD(MyTest)
{
    string filename = std::string(TEST_CASE_DIRECTORY) + "MyTestFile.txt";

    TestOutputForFile(filename);
}