When I create a folder porgrammatically get the error “Invalid item data — missing FileRef”

Question

I trying to add programmatically the detested Folder. I do the following

foreach (SPListItem reparto in reparti.Items)
{
      var folder = dl.Items.Add(dl.RootFolder.ServerRelativeUrl, SPFileSystemObjectType.Folder);
  folder["Title"] = "Test";
  folder.Update();
}

but I get the following error on Update: Invalid item data -- missing FileRef

Why? Tnx

Answer 1

If you want to create a folder, you have to specify its name in the leafName parameter. change your code to :

foreach (SPListItem reparto in reparti.Items)
{
     var folder = dl.Items.Add(
          dl.RootFolder.ServerRelativeUrl, 
          SPFileSystemObjectType.Folder, 
          "Test"
          );

     folder.Update();
}

If it can help, here a small utility method I wrote to create a full folder hierarchy :

/// <summary>
/// Provide utilities methods related to folder management
/// </summary>
public static class SPFolderUtilities
{
    /// <summary>
    /// Ensures the specified folder exists.
    /// </summary>
    /// <param name="list">The list where to create the folder.</param>
    /// <param name="subFolderPath">The sub folder path.</param>
    /// <returns>
    /// The existing <see cref="SPFolder"/> or a newly created if it did not exists.
    /// </returns>
    public static SPFolder EnsureFolder(SPList list, string subFolderPath)
    {
        Contract.Requires<ArgumentNullException>(list != null);
        Contract.Requires<ArgumentNullException>(!string.IsNullOrEmpty(subFolderPath));
        if (!IO.SPPathUtilities.IsFileOrFolderNameValid(subFolderPath, true))
        {
            throw new ArgumentException("Invalid characters in the file or folder name", "subFolderPath");
        }

        var folderPaths = subFolderPath.Split('/');

        var currentFolder = list.RootFolder;
        for (int i = 0; i < folderPaths.Length; i++)
        {
            currentFolder = list.ParentWeb.GetFolder(currentFolder.Url); // hacky refresh
            var subFolder = currentFolder.SubFolders.Cast<SPFolder>().FirstOrDefault(f => string.Compare(f.Name, folderPaths[i], true) == 0);
            if (subFolder == null)
            {
                var newFolderItem = list.Items.Add(currentFolder.ServerRelativeUrl, SPFileSystemObjectType.Folder, folderPaths[i]);
                newFolderItem.SystemUpdate();

                subFolder = newFolderItem.Folder;
            }
            currentFolder = subFolder;
        }
        return currentFolder;
    }
}