Load local HTML file in a C# WebBrowser

Question

In my app I have a WebBrowser element.

I would like to load a local file in it.

I have some questions:

1. Where to place the HTML file (so that it will also be installed if a user executes the setup)
2. how to reference the file? (e.g. my guess is the user's installation folder would not always be the same)

EDIT

I've added the HTML file to my project.

And I have set it up so that it gets copied to output folder.

When I check it it is present when run: \bin\Debug\Documentation\index.html

However when I do the following I get a 'Page cannot be displayed' error in the webbrowser element.

I use the following code to try to display the HTML file in the Webbrowser.

webBrowser1.Navigate(@".\Documentation\index.html");

Answer 1

1. Do a right click->properties on the file in Visual Studio.
2. Set the Copy to Output Directory to Copy always.

Then you will be able to reference your files by using a path such as @".\my_html.html"

Copy to Output Directory will put the file in the same folder as your binary dlls when the project is built. This works with any content file, even if its in a sub folder.

If you use a sub folder, that too will be copied in to the bin folder so your path would then be @".\my_subfolder\my_html.html"

In order to create a URI you can use locally (instead of servered via the web), you'll need to use the file protocol, using the base directory of your binary - note: this will only work if you set the Copy to Ouptut Directory as above or the path will not be correct.

This is what you need:

string curDir = Directory.GetCurrentDirectory();
this.webBrowser1.Url = new Uri(String.Format("file:///{0}/my_html.html", curDir));

You'll have to change the variables and names of course.

Answer 2

quite late but it's the first hit i found from google

Instead of using the current directory or getting the assembly, just use the Application.ExecutablePath property:

//using System.IO;  
string applicationDirectory = Path.GetDirectoryName(Application.ExecutablePath);
string myFile = Path.Combine(applicationDirectory, "Sample.html");
webMain.Url = new Uri("file:///" + myFile);

Answer 3

Note that the file:/// scheme does not work on the compact framework, at least it doesn't with 5.0.

You will need to use the following:

string appDir = Path.GetDirectoryName(
    Assembly.GetExecutingAssembly().GetName().CodeBase);
webBrowser1.Url = new Uri(Path.Combine(appDir, @"Documentation\index.html"));

Answer 4

1. Place it in the Applications setup folder or in a separte folder beneath
2. Reference it relative to the current directory when your app runs.

Answer 5

1. Somewhere, nearby the assembly you're going to run.
2. Use reflection to get path to your executing assembly, then do some magic to locate your HTML file.

Like this:

var myAssembly = System.Reflection.Assembly.GetEntryAssembly();
var myAssemblyLocation = System.IO.Path.GetDirectoryName(a.Location);
var myHtmlPath = Path.Combine(myAssemblyLocation, "my.html");

Answer 6

Update on @ghostJago answer above

for me it worked as the following lines in VS2017

string curDir = Directory.GetCurrentDirectory();
this.webBrowser1.Navigate(new Uri(String.Format("file:///{0}/my_html.html", curDir)));

Answer 7

What worked for me was

<WebBrowser Source="pack://siteoforigin:,,,/StartPage.html" />

from here. I copied StartPage.html to the same output directory as the xaml-file and it loaded it from that relative path.

Answer 8

Windows 10 uwp application.

Try this:

webview.Navigate(new Uri("ms-appx-web:///index.html"));