Microsoft KB Archive/175923

= Sample Visual Basic for Applications code to determine whether a file exists =

Article ID: 175923

Article Last Modified on 5/11/2007

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APPLIES TO


 * Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications 6.0
 * Microsoft Visual Basic for Applications 5.0
 * Microsoft Office Word 2007
 * Microsoft Office Word 2003
 * Microsoft Word 97 Standard Edition

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This article was previously published under Q175923



SUMMARY
This article includes a sample Visual Basic for Applications procedure (or macro) that determines whether a particular file exists.



MORE INFORMATION
Microsoft provides programming examples for illustration only, without warranty either expressed or implied. This includes, but is not limited to, the implied warranties of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. This article assumes that you are familiar with the programming language that is being demonstrated and with the tools that are used to create and to debug procedures. Microsoft support engineers can help explain the functionality of a particular procedure. However, they will not modify these examples to provide added functionality or construct procedures to meet your specific requirements.

You can use the Dir function to check for an existing file by passing the file name and path to the function. If the function returns a zero-length string (""), the file does not exist.

The following sample code checks for the existence of the Autoexec.bat file in the C:\ folder. If the Dir function returns a zero-length string, the file was not found, so a message box displays "No such file!" If the Dir function finds C:\Autoexec.bat, a message box displays "File exists!"

Sample Visual Basic procedure
Sub DoesFileExist Dim FileInQuestion As String FileInQuestion = Dir("C:\Autoexec.bat") If FileInQuestion = "" Then MsgBox "No such file!" Else MsgBox "File exists!" End If  End Sub

