Read from a file starting at the end, similar to tail

Question

In native C#, how can I read from the end of a file?

This is pertinent because I need to read a log file, and it doesn\'t make sense to read 10k, to read the last

Answer 1

The code below uses a random-access FileStream to seed a StreamReader at an offset near the end of the file, discarding the first read line since it is most likely only partial.

FileStream stream = new FileStream(@"c:\temp\build.txt", 
    FileMode.Open, FileAccess.Read);

stream.Seek(-1024, SeekOrigin.End);     // rewind enough for > 1 line

StreamReader reader = new StreamReader(stream);
reader.ReadLine();      // discard partial line

while (!reader.EndOfStream)
{
    string nextLine = reader.ReadLine();
    Console.WriteLine(nextLine);
}