How to launch a process which will open a text file in any editor and automatically move cursor to a certain line number?

Question

From c#, I want to launch a process which will open a text file in any editor and automatically move cursor to a certain line number.

I can open a file using

Answer 1

Get Notepad++, then you can do this:

    var nppDir = (string)Registry.GetValue("HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\SOFTWARE\\Notepad++", null, null);
    var nppExePath = Path.Combine(nppDir, "Notepad++.exe");
    var nppReadmePath = Path.Combine(nppDir, "readme.txt");
    var line = 20;
    var sb = new StringBuilder();
    sb.AppendFormat("\"{0}\" -n{1}", nppReadmePath, line);
    Process.Start(nppExePath, sb.ToString());

In this example we get install path of n++ from the registry, build path to exe and readme.txt file, opens its own readme.txt file with cursor on line 20. Using StringBuilder is more efficient than using multiple appends (explanation somewhere on SO).

Answer 2

Perhaps you are going this the wrong way. I'm not sure what you are trying to accomplish, but I think it would be alot easier to just open the text file in an editor that belongs to your application. Perhaps another form with a WYSIWYG editor control. That way you have full control on where the cursor will land in that editor. Otherwise, there are just way too many unknowns for anything feasibly workable.

Answer 3

The solution very heavily depends on which process/editor is opened on your system. That editor would have to have a developer API that you could use to access functionality such as setting ranges and altering the cursor position. For example, if the editor that is opened is Microsoft Word, you would use the Word Interop API to set a selection at a specific position. There is no universal way to do this in 'any editor' since each one has its own API (or no outward facing API at all).