Associate file extensions in C#


I really needed a simple class to associate a file extension to my applications. That's why I created this simple static class that can associate (programmatically) an extension to my application:



public static class FileAssociator
{
    //[System.Security.Permissions.RegistryPermission(System.Security.Permissions.SecurityAction.Assert, Unrestricted = true)]
    public static void AssociateExtension(string extension, string applicationPath, string identifier,
        string description, string icon)
    {
        RegistryKey CR = Registry.ClassesRoot;

        //CreateRegistryKey   HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Extension
        RegistryKey extensionKey = CR.CreateSubKey(extension);
        //SetRegistryValue of HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Extension, use default value, value= Identifier
        extensionKey.SetValue("", identifier, RegistryValueKind.String);
        extensionKey.Close();

        //CreateRegistryKey HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Identifier
        RegistryKey identifierKey = CR.CreateSubKey(identifier);
        //SetRegistryValue  HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT, Identifier, "", REG_SZ, Description
        identifierKey.SetValue("", description, RegistryValueKind.String);
        if (icon != "")
        {
            //CreateRegistryKey HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Identifier\DefaultIcon
            RegistryKey defaultIconKey = identifierKey.CreateSubKey("DefaultIcon");
            //SetRegistryValue  of HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Identifier\DefaultIcon, use default value,value= Icon
            defaultIconKey.SetValue("", icon); defaultIconKey.Close();
        }

        //Identifier = Identifier + "\shell"
        //CreateRegistryKey HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Identifier
        RegistryKey shellKey = identifierKey.CreateSubKey("shell");
        //Identifier = Identifier + "\open"
        //CreateRegistryKey HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Identifier
        RegistryKey openKey = shellKey.CreateSubKey("open");
        //Identifier = Identifier + "\command"
        //CreateRegistryKey HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Identifier
        RegistryKey commandKey = openKey.CreateSubKey("command");
        //SetRegistryValue  of HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Identifier, use default value,value= ("Application" "%1")
        commandKey.SetValue("","\"" + applicationPath + "\" \"%1" );
        commandKey.Close(); openKey.Close(); shellKey.Close();
        identifierKey.Close();
    }

    public static void AssociateExtension(string extension, string applicationPath, string identifier,
        string description)
    {
        AssociateExtension(extension, applicationPath, identifier, description, "");
    }
}

To use the registry functionality in the .NET Framework (the RegistryKey class), the following statement eases the job:

using Microsoft.Win32;

And here is a sample use for my application:

FileAssociator.AssociateExtension(".click", Application.ExecutablePath, "clickfile", "Autoclick key combination file");

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