In MFC, the most common way to open a file is a two-stage process.

1. Create the file object without specifying a path or permission flags.

   You usually create a file object by declaring a CFile variable on the stack frame.

2. Call the Open member function for the file object, supplying a path and permission flags.

   The return value for Open will be nonzero if the file was opened successfully or 0 if the specified file could not be opened. The Open member function is prototyped as follows:

   virtual BOOL Open( LPCTSTR lpszFileName, UINT nOpenFlags, CFileException* pError = NULL );

   The open flags specify which permissions, such as read-only, you want for the file. The possible flag values are defined as enumerated constants within the CFile class, so they are qualified with "CFile::" as in CFile::modeRead. Use the CFile::modeCreate flag if you want to create the file.

The following example shows how to create a new file with read/write permission (replacing any previous file with the same path):

[!code-cppNVC_MFCFiles#1]

CFile Class
CFile::Open
Files