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File Handling

Python provides built in functions to work with file. No import is required.

f = open("textfile.txt", "w+")
for i in range(10):
    f.write("This is line"+str(i)+"\n")
f.close()

open function takes two arguments. One is the file name, and the other is the mode in which you want to open the file. Here it is w+ meaning - open file in write mode, create file if it does not exist. Similarly r and a stands for read and append mode respectively. f.read() is used to read the entire content of the file. While, f.readline() reads line by line and returns a list.

Operating System related features

os module is used to perform operating system related operations. The path module in it is used for path related features.

import os
from os import path
print(os.name)
print("Item exists: "+str(path.exists("textfile.txt")))
print("Item is a file: "+str(path.isfile("textfile.txt")))
print("Item is a directory: "+str(path.isdir("textfile.txt")))
print("Item path: "+str(path.realpath("textfile.txt")))
print("Item path:", path.realpath("textfile.txt"))
print("Item path and name:", path.split(path.realpath("textfile.txt"))) # returns a tuple

os.path modules provides access to all features of a file. This includes modification time, creation time, etc.

import time
t = time.ctime(path.getmtime("textfile.txt")) # 'Tue Jan 29 12:14:03 2019'
print(datetime.datetime.getTimeStamp(path.getmtime("textfile.txt"))) # 2019-01-29 12:14:03.159570

.getmtime return the modified time in float. time.ctime is used to convert it to real time. Following are examples to copying, renaming a file., and archiving the entire folder or specific files in the folder.

import shutil
import os
from os import path
from shutil import make_archive
from zipfile import ZipFile
shutil.copy(src, dest) # copy file from src to destination
# destination should contain file name as well
os.rename("old_name", "new_name")
# To zip a folder
root_dir, tail = path.split(src)
make_archive(archive_name, "zip", root_dir)
# When selective file is to added to zip
with ZipFile("textarchive.zip", "w") as newzip:
    newzip.write("textfile.txt")
    newzip.write("textfile.txt.bak")

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