GetFileAttributesEx

GetFileAttributesEx is a function in the Windows API used to retrieve extended attributes for a specified file or directory. It is part of the Windows operating system and is accessible through programming languages that interface with the Win32 API, such as C++ and C#.

The function takes two arguments: the name of the file or directory, and a pointer to a WIN32_FILE_ATTRIBUTE_DATA structure. This structure is populated by the function with various attributes of the file or directory. These attributes include the file size, creation, last access, and last write times, as well as the file's normal attributes. The normal attributes are represented by a bitmask and can indicate whether the file is read-only, hidden, a system file, a directory, an archive, or compressed, among other flags.

The primary purpose of GetFileAttributesEx is to obtain detailed information about a file without needing to open it. This makes it efficient for tasks such as checking file existence, determining file type, or querying modification dates. It provides a more comprehensive set of information compared to the older GetFileAttributes function, which returns only the basic file attributes. The WIN32_FILE_ATTRIBUTE_DATA structure is defined by the operating system and contains fields for the dwFileAttributes, ftCreationTime, ftLastAccessTime, ftLastWriteTime, nFileSizeHigh, and nFileSizeLow members. The nFileSizeHigh and nFileSizeLow members together represent the file size in bytes.