Why does a path work even if it contains an @ before "\\"

Question

Im a bit confused. I thought "@" in c# ist a sign for to interpret text literally like @"C:\Users...". It avoids the need of a double backslash.

But why does paths also work if they contain double backslashes and the @? Fe:

var temp = File.ReadAllText(@"C:\\Users\\text.txt").ToString(); // no error

I that case the string must be literally "C:\\Users\\text.txt" - because of the previous "@" - which is not a valid windows path (EDIT: Thats wrong, it is a valid Path, only explorer wont accept it - thanks to Muctadir Dinar), so why does this work?

Thanks in advance

Answer 1

Because internally FileStream during initialization calls iternal Path.NormalizePath(path, true, maxPathLength) method to normalize passed path value.

You can call this method with reflection (it has overload, so getting MethodInfo is a little bit tricky):

string path = @"C:\\Users\\text.txt";
Type type = typeof(Path);
var flags = BindingFlags.Static | BindingFlags.NonPublic;
var binder = Type.DefaultBinder;
var types = new Type[] { typeof(string), typeof(bool), typeof(int) };
var modifiers = new ParameterModifier[0];

var normalize = type.GetMethod("NormalizePath", flags, binder, types, modifiers);
var result = normalize.Invoke(null, new object[] { path, true, 256});

Output:

C:\Users\text.txt