brl_filesystem.md 11 KB


id: brl.filesystem title: BRL.FileSystem

sidebar_label: BRL.FileSystem

The BlitzMax filesystem module contains commands to perform operations on the computer's files and directories.

OpenFile, ReadFile and WriteFile return a stream object for reading and or writing data to files.

Directories can be examined file by file using a combination of the ReadDir, NextFile and CloseDir commands, or LoadDir can be used to read the file names of a directory into a string array.

File properties can be examined with the FileType, FileTime, FileSize and FileMode commands.

Files and directories (folders) can be created and deleted with the CreateFile, CreateDir DeleteFile and DeleteDir commands.

Finally, the FileSystem module contains various utility functions for handling file paths in a system independent manner. These commands include RealPath, StripDir, StripExt, StripAll, ExtractDir and ExtractExt.

Functions

Function StripDir$( path$ )

Strip directory from a file path

Example

' stripdir.bmx

print stripdir("mypath/myfile.bmx")	'prints myfile.bmx

Function StripExt$( path$ )

Strip extension from a file path

Example

' stripext.bmx

print stripext("mypath/myfile.bmx")	'prints mypath/myfile

Function StripAll$( path$ )

Strip directory and extension from a file path

Example

' stripall.bmx

print stripall("mypath/myfile.bmx")	'prints myfile

Function StripSlash$( path$ )

Strip trailing slash from a file path

StripSlash will not remove the trailing slash from a 'root' path. For example, "/" or (on Win32 only) "C:/".

Example

' stripslash.bmx

print stripslash("mypath/")	'prints mypath

Function ExtractDir$( path$ )

Extract directory from a file path

Example

' extractdir.bmx

print extractdir("mypath/myfile.bmx")	'prints mypath

Function ExtractExt$( path$ )

Extract extension from a file path

Example

' extractext.bmx

print extractext("mypath/myfile.bmx")	'prints bmx

Function CurrentDir$()

Get Current Directory

Returns

The current directory

Example

' currentdir.bmx

cd$=currentdir()
print "CurrentDir()="+cd$

Function RealPath$( path$ )

Get real, absolute path of a file path

Example

' realpath.bmx

print realpath("realpath.bmx")	'prints full path of this source

print realpath("..") 'prints full path of parent directory

Function FileType:Int( path$ )

Get file type

Returns

0 if file at path doesn't exist, FILETYPE_FILE (1) if the file is a plain file or FILETYPE_DIR (2) if the file is a directory

Example

' filetype.bmx

print filetype(".")		'prints 2 for directory type
print filetype("filetype.bmx")	'prints 1 for file type
print filetype("notfound.file")	'prints 0 for doesn't exist

Function FileTime:Int( path$, timetype:Int=FILETIME_MODIFIED )

Get file time

Returns

The time the file at path was last modified

Example

' filetime.bmx

print filetime("filetime.bmx")

Function FileSize:Long( path$ )

Get file size

Returns

Size, in bytes, of the file at path, or -1 if the file does not exist

Example

' filesize.bmx

' the following prints the size of this source file in bytes

print filesize("filesize.bmx")

Function FileMode:Int( path$ )

Get file mode

Returns

file mode flags

Example

' filemode.bmx

' the following function converts the file mode to 
' the standard unix permission bits string

Function Permissions$(mode)
	local	testbit,pos
	local	p$="rwxrwxrwx"
	testbit=%100000000
	pos=1
	while (testbit)
		if mode & testbit res$:+mid$(p$,pos,1) else res$:+"-"
		testbit=testbit shr 1
		pos:+1	
	wend
	return res
End Function

print Permissions$(filemode("filemode.bmx"))

Function SetFileMode( path$,Mode:Int )

Set file mode

Example

' setfilemode.bmx

' the following makes this source file readonly

writebits=%010010010

' read the file mode

mode=filemode("setfilemode.bmx")

'mask out the write bits to make readonly

mode=mode & writebits

'set the new file mode

setfilemode("setfilemode.bmx",mode)

Function CreateFile:Int( path$ )

Create a file

Returns

True if successful

Example

' createfile.bmx

success=createfile("myfile")
if not success runtimeerror "error creating file"

Function CreateDir:Int( path$,recurse:Int=False )

Create a directory

If recurse is true, any required subdirectories are also created.

Returns

True if successful

Example

' createdir.bmx

success=createdir("myfolder")
if not success runtimeerror "error creating directory"

Function DeleteFile:Int( path$ )

Delete a file

Returns

True if successful

Example

' deletefile.bmx

success=deletefile("myfile")
if not success runtimeerror "error deleting file"

Function RenameFile:Int( oldpath$,newpath$ )

Renames a file

Returns

True if successful

Function CopyFile:Int( src$,dst$ )

Copy a file

Returns

True if successful

Function CopyDir:Int( src$,dst$ )

Copy a directory

Returns

True if successful

Function DeleteDir:Int( path$,recurse:Int=False )

Delete a directory

Set recurse to true to delete all subdirectories and files recursively - but be careful!

Returns

True if successful

Example

' deletedir.bmx

success=deletedir("myfolder")
if not success runtimeerror "error deleting directory"

Function ChangeDir:Int( path$ )

Change current directory

Returns

True if successful

Example

' changedir.bmx

print "CurrentDir()="+currentdir()

' change current folder to the parent folder

changedir ".."

' print new CurrentDir()

print "CurrentDir()="+currentdir()

Function ReadDir:Byte Ptr( path$ )

Open a directory

Returns

A directory handle, or 0 if the directory does not exist

Example

' readdir.bmx

dir=ReadDir(CurrentDir())

If Not dir RuntimeError "failed to read current directory"

Repeat
	t$=NextFile( dir )
	If t="" Exit
	If t="." Or t=".." Continue
	Print t	
Forever

CloseDir dir

Function NextFile$( dir:Byte Ptr )

Return next file in a directory

Returns

File name of next file in directory opened using ReadDir, or an empty string if there are no more files to read.

Function CloseDir( dir:Byte Ptr )

Close a directory

Function LoadDir$[]( dir$,skip_dots:Int=True )

Load a directory

The skip_dots parameter, if true, removes the '.' (current) and '..' (parent) directories from the returned array.

Returns

A string array containing contents of dir

Example

' loaddir.bmx

' declare a string array

local files$[]

files=loaddir(currentdir())

for t$=eachin files
	print t	
next

Function OpenFile:TStream( url:Object,readable:Int=True,writeable:Int=True )

Open a file for input and/or output.

This command is similar to the OpenStream command but will attempt to cache the contents of the file to ensure serial streams such as http: based url's are seekable. Use the CloseStream command when finished reading and or writing to a Stream returned by OpenFile.

Example

' openfile.bmx

' the following prints the contents of this source file 

file=openfile("openfile.bmx")

if not file runtimeerror "could not open file openfile.bmx"

while not eof(file)
	print readline(file)
wend
closestream file

Function ReadFile:TStream( url:Object )

Open a file For Input.

This command is similar to the ReadStream command but will attempt to cache the contents of the file to ensure serial streams such as http: based url's are seekable. Use the CloseStream command when finished reading and or writing to a Stream returned by OpenFile.

Example

' readfile.bmx

' the following prints the contents of this source file 

file=readfile("readfile.bmx")

if not file runtimeerror "could not open file openfile.bmx"

while not eof(file)
	print readline(file)
wend

closestream file

Function WriteFile:TStream( url:Object )

Open a file for output.

This command is identical to the WriteStream command.

Example

' writefile.bmx

file=writefile("test.txt")

if not file runtimeerror "failed to open test.txt file" 

writeline file,"hello world"

closestream file

Function CloseFile( stream:TStream )

Closes a file stream.

After performing file operations on an open file make sure to close the file stream with either CloseFile or the identical CloseStream command.