Merlin’s Delphi Forge

Delphi’s runtime library does not provide any routines for copying or moving files. However, you can directly call the Windows API CopyFile() function to copy a file. CopyFile() is also useful when moving files across drives because neither Delphi’s RenameFile() function nor the Windows API MoveFile() function can rename/move files across drives.

!!Note: The file attributes for the existing file are copied to the new file, but the security attributes are not.

Here’s the Delphi code:

uses
  Windows;
...
  (* sSource - (PChar or string if typecasted) The full name of the source
  **   file.
  ** sDestination - (PChar or string if typecasted) The full name of the
  **   destination file.
  ** bNoOverwrite - (Boolean) Set False if you want to overwrite existing
  **   files, else set True.
  **
  ** Function result: True if successful, else it will return False.
  *)
  CopyFile(PChar(sSource), PChar(sDestination), bNoOverwrite);
...

Examples:

{ Both examples allow file overwriting }
CopyFile('C:\\Autoexec.bat', 'A:\\Backup\\Autoexec.bat', False);
CopyFile(PChar(Edit1.Text), PChar(Edit2.Text), False);

Tags: api, code, copy, copyfile, Delphi, delphi code, file, files, move, move files, movefile, open source, overwrite, routine, runtime library, security attributes, source, source code, source file, tip, trick, windows, windows api