How to retrieve the target of a Junction or Symlink with a standard user

Question

I am trying to get the target of a junction in my program, but the only way I managed do it is:

1. Requesting Backup privileges
2. p-invoke CreateFile with special parameters to get a handle to the file/dir.
3. DeviceIoControl call to the get the target.

The 1st step will not work with normal user accounts, because they have no Backup privileges, and I don't want to get the UAC User Consent window every time I do this.

I think this is doable somehow, because a normal "dir /A:L" command resolves the target of the links.

Answer 1

I think that this answer in stackoverflow would help you? How do I programmatically access the target path of a windows symbolic link? It should be possible to include a reference to the function via DllImport Attribute in a c# program.

The required handle is obtainable from the a FileStream instance. Somewhat funny that it is marked as obsolete, but maybe the warning states what else you can do.