How can I make a "return one directory" function?

[bergjensen33]

Let us say I want to represent the current working directory as a std::string and I need to return one directory back. What is the most efficient way of implementing it you can think of?
My train of thought goes something around the lines of:
>make sure the passed std::string is a valid directory
>check whether the current working directory is the root, then return the root
>else return the current working directory but only to the char before the last '/'
Is there a better way of implementing this?

[JLBorges]

std::filesystem::current_path().string()
https://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/filesystem/current_path

[bergjensen33]

JLBorges, that's not exactly what I needed, but still, thank you.

[George P]

What exactly do you mean by "return one directory"?

Are you wanting to get what the parent directory is for the current directory? If the current working dir is (Windows): C:\Dir_1_\Dir_2_ do you want C:\Dir_1_?

Take a gander at https://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/filesystem/path under the decomposition section.

[bergjensen33]

Thank you a million, George P, that's exactly what I needed.