The path of a current file is defined with the help of directory hierarchy; and it contains the backtracked path from the current file to the root directory this file is present in. For instance, consider a file “my_file” belongs to a directory “my_directory”, the path for this file is defined as given below ./my_directory/my_file The directory, sub-directory and the file are all separated using the “/” separator in the path. Therefore, to get current file's full path, you can use the os.path.abspath() function. If you want only the directory path, you can call os.path.dirname() method. Using os.path.abspath() Method ... Read More

In Python, the __init__.py is a special file in python packages. It is used to indicate that how a directory should be treated. When Python encounters a directory during an import, first it looks for the __init__.py file to determine how to initialize the package and what code should be executed during the import. In python 3.3 version, the __init__.py was introduced with the feature of creating a package with the namespace. Let's understand the purpose of the __init__.py file - It makes the directory a Python package so the interpreter can find the module ... Read More

A directory is simply defined as a collection of subdirectories and single files or either one of them. These subdirectories are separated using a "/" operator in a directory hierarchy. A directory hierarchy is constructed by organizing all the files and subdirectories within a main directory and also known as the "root" directory. Calculating the total size of a directory, i.e., all its files and subdirectories which is a common task in Python, especially when dealing with disk usage monitoring, backup management, or cleaning up storage. Python provides multiple ways to accomplish this efficiently using built-in modules such as os ... Read More

In some applications, we have to find the files on our computer programmatically to make use of out time. Python provides several powerful libraries to search and locate files by making this task straightforward and efficient. In this article, we are going to see the different methods to find a file in our system using Python. Using the os Module The os module has a method os.walk(), which is used to search for a file in the directories and their subdirectories. This method returns the file paths in a directory which allows the user to search for a specific file. ... Read More

The site-packages directory in python, is the place where third-party libraries and packages are installed. Knowning the site-packeges location is useful for debugging, verifying installations or inspecting package contents. This directory may vary depending on our operating system, Python version or based on the virtual environment we are using. In this article, we are going to explore the different ways to find the location of site packages directory in our working environments. Using site.getsitepackages() The getsitepackages() function of the site module, returns a list of global site-packages directories. This method may not work inside virtual environments and could be unavailable ... Read More

A directory is simply defined as a collection of subdirectories and single files or either one of them. A directory hierarchy is constructed by organizing all the files and subdirectories within a main directory and this is also known as root directory. These subdirectories are separated using a / operator in a directory hierarchy. In python, we have different methods to scan through a directory recursively. In this article we are going to see about each method. Using os.walk() method Using glob.glob() method Using os.listdir() method ... Read More

When we are building Python applications that store or retrieve user-specific files and settings, then we will often need to access the home directory. The home directory is the default location on a computer where user-related data is stored, such as documents, configuration files, and application data. Python provides simple and cross-platform ways of finding the home directory programmatically by making it easy to write code that works on Windows, macOS, and Linux without modifications. In this article, we'll explore the different methods to get the home directory in Python. Using os.path.expanduser("~") The os.path.expanduser() is a function in Python's built-in ... Read More

Directory creation is a common task for computer users. You might need to create a directory to store some files, or to place some new files inside an existing directory. In this article, you will learn how to find if a directory already exists in Python or not. A directory is a file system structure used by operating systems and software applications to organize files. It can also refer to a list of files and folders, like the current folder in Windows Explorer. Sometimes there arises a need to check whether a certain directory exists in a system or not; ... Read More

In Python, sharing common data such as constants, configuration settings or shared resources among multiple files is a routine task in modular application development. The data will be centralized in a dedicated module which allows it to be maintained in one place and imported wherever needed. Before proceeding with various approaches to share data among multiple Python files, first we need to understand what is a module and what is shared data. What is a Module? A Module is a Python file (.py) that contains definitions such as variables, functions, classes or runnable code. By placing shared data in its ... Read More

In most of the applications, especially in data processing, software development or testing, it is required to compare two files to detect changes, validate outputs or find discrepancies. Python offers several ways to compare files which ranges from basic line-by-line comparisons to more advanced diff utilities. Following are the key methods which are used to compare two files in python - Line-by-line comparison: This is a straightforward approach to textual differences. difflib module: This module is used to produce human-readable diffs similar to Unix’s diff command. filecmp module: This module is used for quick binary or shallow comparisons. ... Read More