ASP.NET: Base Directory and Developer Tests

Assume that in your ASP.NET application you need to access a file that is part of the deployed web site. On the other hand you would like to also run some developer tests.

The way I like to organize developer tests is putting them in a separate project and a separate assembly. For example for an ASP.NET project “MySite” I would have a second project called “MySite.Tests”. In the test project I then reference the “MySite” project which gives me direct access to all code inside of “MySite”. Typically give all projects a strong name and therefore can make internals of “MySite” visible to code in “MySite.Tests” by placing the InternalsVisibleToAttribute on the “MySite” assembly.

The challenge now with accessing the file is that depending on whether they are run from within an ASP.NET server (IIS or WebDev.WebServer) or within a unit test runner, finding the root folder (or base directory) can be tricky in some cases.

For example we could use a solution based on the MapPath method of the HttpContext.Current.Server object. This is described in more details in an answer on StackOverflow and works when an HttpContext is available. When the same code is run in a unit test runner HttpContext.Current is null (Controller.HttpContext in MVC), so this solution wouldn’t work.

The solution that I have chosen and that works so far is based on the application domain. The following code is all that is required and it works in both IIS, WebDev.WebServer as well as when executed within a unit test runner:

var domainRoot = AppDomain.CurrentDomain.BaseDirectory;
var configFile = Path.Combine(domainRoot, Common.DbSettingsFile);

Happy coding!