I used to open files that were in the same directory as the currently running Python script by simply using a command like:
open("Some file.txt", "r")
However, I discovered that when the script was run in Windows by double-clicking it, it would try to open the file from the wrong directory.
Since then I've used a command of the form
open(os.path.join(sys.path[0], "Some file.txt"), "r")
whenever I wanted to open a file. This works for my particular usage, but I'm not sure if sys.path[0] might fail in some other use case.
So my question is: What is the best and most reliable way to open a file that's in the same directory as the currently running Python script?
Here's what I've been able to figure out so far:
os.getcwd() and os.path.abspath('') return the "current working directory", not the script directory.
os.path.dirname(sys.argv[0]) and os.path.dirname(__file__) return the path used to call the script, which may be relative or even blank (if the script is in the cwd). Also, __file__ does not exist when the script is run in IDLE or PythonWin.
sys.path[0] and os.path.abspath(os.path.dirname(sys.argv[0])) seem to return the script directory. I'm not sure if there's any difference between these two.
Edit:
I just realized that what I want to do would be better described as "open a file in the same directory as the containing module". In other words, if I import a module I wrote that's in another directory, and that module opens a file, I want it to look for the file in the module's directory. I don't think anything I've found is able to do that...
I always use:
__location__ = os.path.realpath(
os.path.join(os.getcwd(), os.path.dirname(__file__)))
The join() call prepends the current working directory, but the documentation says that if some path is absolute, all other paths left of it are dropped. Therefore, getcwd() is dropped when dirname(__file__) returns an absolute path.
Also, the realpath call resolves symbolic links if any are found. This avoids troubles when deploying with setuptools on Linux systems (scripts are symlinked to /usr/bin/ -- at least on Debian).
You may the use the following to open up files in the same folder:
f = open(os.path.join(__location__, 'bundled-resource.jpg'))
# ...
I use this to bundle resources with several Django application on both Windows and Linux and it works like a charm!
On Python 3.4, the pathlib module was added, and the following code will reliably open a file in the same directory as the current script:
from pathlib import Path
p = Path(__file__).with_name('file.txt')
with p.open('r') as f:
print(f.read())
If you instead need the file path as a string for some open-like API, you can get it using absolute():
p = Path(__file__).with_name('file.txt')
filename = p.absolute()
NOTE: Python REPLs such as running the python command without a target or ipython do not expose __file__.
To quote from the Python documentation:
As initialized upon program startup, the first item of this list, path[0], is the directory containing the script that was used to invoke the Python interpreter. If the script directory is not available (e.g. if the interpreter is invoked interactively or if the script is read from standard input), path[0] is the empty string, which directs Python to search modules in the current directory first. Notice that the script directory is inserted before the entries inserted as a result of PYTHONPATH.
If you are running the script from the terminal, sys.path[0] is what you are looking for.
However, if you have:
barpath/bar.py
import foopath.foo
foopath/foo.py
print sys.path[0] # you get barpath
So watch out!
Ok here is what I do
sys.argv is always what you type into the terminal or use as the file path when executing it with python.exe or pythonw.exe
For example you can run the file text.py several ways, they each give you a different answer they always give you the path that python was typed.
C:\Documents and Settings\Admin>python test.py
sys.argv[0]: test.py
C:\Documents and Settings\Admin>python "C:\Documents and Settings\Admin\test.py"
sys.argv[0]: C:\Documents and Settings\Admin\test.py
Ok so know you can get the file name, great big deal, now to get the application directory you can know use os.path, specifically abspath and dirname
import sys, os
print os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(sys.argv[0]))
That will output this:
C:\Documents and Settings\Admin\
it will always output this no matter if you type python test.py or python "C:\Documents and Settings\Admin\test.py"
The problem with using __file__
Consider these two files
test.py
import sys
import os
def paths():
print "__file__: %s" % __file__
print "sys.argv: %s" % sys.argv[0]
a_f = os.path.abspath(__file__)
a_s = os.path.abspath(sys.argv[0])
print "abs __file__: %s" % a_f
print "abs sys.argv: %s" % a_s
if __name__ == "__main__":
paths()
import_test.py
import test
import sys
test.paths()
print "--------"
print __file__
print sys.argv[0]
Output of "python test.py"
C:\Documents and Settings\Admin>python test.py
__file__: test.py
sys.argv: test.py
abs __file__: C:\Documents and Settings\Admin\test.py
abs sys.argv: C:\Documents and Settings\Admin\test.py
Output of "python test_import.py"
C:\Documents and Settings\Admin>python test_import.py
__file__: C:\Documents and Settings\Admin\test.pyc
sys.argv: test_import.py
abs __file__: C:\Documents and Settings\Admin\test.pyc
abs sys.argv: C:\Documents and Settings\Admin\test_import.py
--------
test_import.py
test_import.py
So as you can see file gives you always the python file it is being run from, where as sys.argv[0] gives you the file that you ran from the interpreter always. Depending on your needs you will need to choose which one best fits your needs.
I commonly use the following. It works for testing and probably other use cases as well.
with open(os.path.join(os.path.dirname(__file__), 'some_file.txt'), 'r') as f:
This answer is recommended in https://stackoverflow.com/questions/10174211/how-to-make-an-always-relative-to-current-module-file-path
Can you try this simple approach just like this:
import os
my_local_file = os.path.join(os.path.dirname(__file__), 'some_file.txt')
f = open(my_local_file, "r")
my_local_data = f.read()
Because I get an error trying to use __file__ or sys.argv[0] from emacs I do it that way:
from inspect import getfile
from pathlib import Path
script_path = getfile(lambda: None)
print(script_path)
parent_path = Path(script_path).parent
print(parent_path)
with open(parent_path/'Some file.txt', 'r') as obFile:
print(obFile.read())
After trying all of this solutions, I still had different problems. So what I found the simplest way was to create a python file: config.py, with a dictionary containing the file's absolute path and import it into the script.
something like
import config as cfg
import pandas as pd
pd.read_csv(cfg.paths['myfilepath'])
where config.py has inside:
paths = {'myfilepath': 'home/docs/...'}
It is not automatic but it is a good solution when you have to work in different directory or different machines.
I'd do it this way:
from os.path import abspath, exists
f_path = abspath("fooabar.txt")
if exists(f_path):
with open(f_path) as f:
print f.read()
The above code builds an absolute path to the file using abspath and is equivalent to using normpath(join(os.getcwd(), path)) [that's from the pydocs]. It then checks if that file actually exists and then uses a context manager to open it so you don't have to remember to call close on the file handle. IMHO, doing it this way will save you a lot of pain in the long run.
Related
I would like to see what is the best way to determine the current script directory in Python.
I discovered that, due to the many ways of calling Python code, it is hard to find a good solution.
Here are some problems:
__file__ is not defined if the script is executed with exec, execfile
__module__ is defined only in modules
Use cases:
./myfile.py
python myfile.py
./somedir/myfile.py
python somedir/myfile.py
execfile('myfile.py') (from another script, that can be located in another directory and that can have another current directory.
I know that there is no perfect solution, but I'm looking for the best approach that solves most of the cases.
The most used approach is os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__)) but this really doesn't work if you execute the script from another one with exec().
Warning
Any solution that uses current directory will fail, this can be different based on the way the script is called or it can be changed inside the running script.
os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__))
is indeed the best you're going to get.
It's unusual to be executing a script with exec/execfile; normally you should be using the module infrastructure to load scripts. If you must use these methods, I suggest setting __file__ in the globals you pass to the script so it can read that filename.
There's no other way to get the filename in execed code: as you note, the CWD may be in a completely different place.
If you really want to cover the case that a script is called via execfile(...), you can use the inspect module to deduce the filename (including the path). As far as I am aware, this will work for all cases you listed:
filename = inspect.getframeinfo(inspect.currentframe()).filename
path = os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(filename))
In Python 3.4+ you can use the simpler pathlib module:
from inspect import currentframe, getframeinfo
from pathlib import Path
filename = getframeinfo(currentframe()).filename
parent = Path(filename).resolve().parent
You can also use __file__ (when it's available) to avoid the inspect module altogether:
from pathlib import Path
parent = Path(__file__).resolve().parent
#!/usr/bin/env python
import inspect
import os
import sys
def get_script_dir(follow_symlinks=True):
if getattr(sys, 'frozen', False): # py2exe, PyInstaller, cx_Freeze
path = os.path.abspath(sys.executable)
else:
path = inspect.getabsfile(get_script_dir)
if follow_symlinks:
path = os.path.realpath(path)
return os.path.dirname(path)
print(get_script_dir())
It works on CPython, Jython, Pypy. It works if the script is executed using execfile() (sys.argv[0] and __file__ -based solutions would fail here). It works if the script is inside an executable zip file (/an egg). It works if the script is "imported" (PYTHONPATH=/path/to/library.zip python -mscript_to_run) from a zip file; it returns the archive path in this case. It works if the script is compiled into a standalone executable (sys.frozen). It works for symlinks (realpath eliminates symbolic links). It works in an interactive interpreter; it returns the current working directory in this case.
The os.path... approach was the 'done thing' in Python 2.
In Python 3, you can find directory of script as follows:
from pathlib import Path
script_path = Path(__file__).parent
Note: this answer is now a package (also with safe relative importing capabilities)
https://github.com/heetbeet/locate
$ pip install locate
$ python
>>> from locate import this_dir
>>> print(this_dir())
C:/Users/simon
For .py scripts as well as interactive usage:
I frequently use the directory of my scripts (for accessing files stored alongside them), but I also frequently run these scripts in an interactive shell for debugging purposes. I define this_dir as:
When running or importing a .py file, the file's base directory. This is always the correct path.
When running an .ipyn notebook, the current working directory. This is always the correct path, since Jupyter sets the working directory as the .ipynb base directory.
When running in a REPL, the current working directory. Hmm, what is the actual "correct path" when the code is detached from a file? Rather, make it your responsibility to change into the "correct path" before invoking the REPL.
Python 3.4 (and above):
from pathlib import Path
this_dir = Path(globals().get("__file__", "./_")).absolute().parent
Python 2 (and above):
import os
this_dir = os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(globals().get("__file__", "./_")))
Explanation:
globals() returns all the global variables as a dictionary.
.get("__file__", "./_") returns the value from the key "__file__" if it exists in globals(), otherwise it returns the provided default value "./_".
The rest of the code just expands __file__ (or "./_") into an absolute filepath, and then returns the filepath's base directory.
Alternative:
If you know for certain that __file__ is available to your surrounding code, you can simplify to this:
>= Python 3.4: this_dir = Path(__file__).absolute().parent
>= Python 2: this_dir = os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__))
Would
import os
cwd = os.getcwd()
do what you want? I'm not sure what exactly you mean by the "current script directory". What would the expected output be for the use cases you gave?
Just use os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__)) and examine very carefully whether there is a real need for the case where exec is used. It could be a sign of troubled design if you are not able to use your script as a module.
Keep in mind Zen of Python #8, and if you believe there is a good argument for a use-case where it must work for exec, then please let us know some more details about the background of the problem.
First.. a couple missing use-cases here if we're talking about ways to inject anonymous code..
code.compile_command()
code.interact()
imp.load_compiled()
imp.load_dynamic()
imp.load_module()
__builtin__.compile()
loading C compiled shared objects? example: _socket?)
But, the real question is, what is your goal - are you trying to enforce some sort of security? Or are you just interested in whats being loaded.
If you're interested in security, the filename that is being imported via exec/execfile is inconsequential - you should use rexec, which offers the following:
This module contains the RExec class,
which supports r_eval(), r_execfile(),
r_exec(), and r_import() methods, which
are restricted versions of the standard
Python functions eval(), execfile() and
the exec and import statements. Code
executed in this restricted environment
will only have access to modules and
functions that are deemed safe; you can
subclass RExec add or remove capabilities as
desired.
However, if this is more of an academic pursuit.. here are a couple goofy approaches that you
might be able to dig a little deeper into..
Example scripts:
./deep.py
print ' >> level 1'
execfile('deeper.py')
print ' << level 1'
./deeper.py
print '\t >> level 2'
exec("import sys; sys.path.append('/tmp'); import deepest")
print '\t << level 2'
/tmp/deepest.py
print '\t\t >> level 3'
print '\t\t\t I can see the earths core.'
print '\t\t << level 3'
./codespy.py
import sys, os
def overseer(frame, event, arg):
print "loaded(%s)" % os.path.abspath(frame.f_code.co_filename)
sys.settrace(overseer)
execfile("deep.py")
sys.exit(0)
Output
loaded(/Users/synthesizerpatel/deep.py)
>> level 1
loaded(/Users/synthesizerpatel/deeper.py)
>> level 2
loaded(/Users/synthesizerpatel/<string>)
loaded(/tmp/deepest.py)
>> level 3
I can see the earths core.
<< level 3
<< level 2
<< level 1
Of course, this is a resource-intensive way to do it, you'd be tracing
all your code.. Not very efficient. But, I think it's a novel approach
since it continues to work even as you get deeper into the nest.
You can't override 'eval'. Although you can override execfile().
Note, this approach only coveres exec/execfile, not 'import'.
For higher level 'module' load hooking you might be able to use use
sys.path_hooks (Write-up courtesy of PyMOTW).
Thats all I have off the top of my head.
Here is a partial solution, still better than all published ones so far.
import sys, os, os.path, inspect
#os.chdir("..")
if '__file__' not in locals():
__file__ = inspect.getframeinfo(inspect.currentframe())[0]
print os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__))
Now this works will all calls but if someone use chdir() to change the current directory, this will also fail.
Notes:
sys.argv[0] is not going to work, will return -c if you execute the script with python -c "execfile('path-tester.py')"
I published a complete test at https://gist.github.com/1385555 and you are welcome to improve it.
To get the absolute path to the directory containing the current script you can use:
from pathlib import Path
absDir = Path(__file__).parent.resolve()
Please note the .resolve() call is required, because that is the one making the path absolute. Without resolve(), you would obtain something like '.'.
This solution uses pathlib, which is part of Python's stdlib since v3.4 (2014). This is preferrable compared to other solutions using os.
The official pathlib documentation has a useful table mapping the old os functions to the new ones: https://docs.python.org/3/library/pathlib.html#correspondence-to-tools-in-the-os-module
This should work in most cases:
import os,sys
dirname=os.path.dirname(os.path.realpath(sys.argv[0]))
Hopefully this helps:-
If you run a script/module from anywhere you'll be able to access the __file__ variable which is a module variable representing the location of the script.
On the other hand, if you're using the interpreter you don't have access to that variable, where you'll get a name NameError and os.getcwd() will give you the incorrect directory if you're running the file from somewhere else.
This solution should give you what you're looking for in all cases:
from inspect import getsourcefile
from os.path import abspath
abspath(getsourcefile(lambda:0))
I haven't thoroughly tested it but it solved my problem.
If __file__ is available:
# -- script1.py --
import os
file_path = os.path.abspath(__file__)
print(os.path.dirname(file_path))
For those we want to be able to run the command from the interpreter or get the path of the place you're running the script from:
# -- script2.py --
import os
print(os.path.abspath(''))
This works from the interpreter.
But when run in a script (or imported) it gives the path of the place where
you ran the script from, not the path of directory containing
the script with the print.
Example:
If your directory structure is
test_dir (in the home dir)
├── main.py
└── test_subdir
├── script1.py
└── script2.py
with
# -- main.py --
import script1.py
import script2.py
The output is:
~/test_dir/test_subdir
~/test_dir
As previous answers require you to import some module, I thought that I would write one answer that doesn't. Use the code below if you don't want to import anything.
this_dir = '/'.join(__file__.split('/')[:-1])
print(this_dir)
If the script is on /path/to/script.py then this would print /path/to. Note that this will throw error on terminal as no file is executed. This basically parse the directory from __file__ removing the last part of it. In this case /script.py is removed to produce the output /path/to.
print(__import__("pathlib").Path(__file__).parent)
How can I find the full path to the currently running Python script? That is to say, what do I have to do to achieve this:
$ pwd
/tmp
$ python baz.py
running from /tmp
file is baz.py
__file__ is NOT what you are looking for. Don't use accidental side-effects
sys.argv[0] is always the path to the script (if in fact a script has been invoked) -- see http://docs.python.org/library/sys.html#sys.argv
__file__ is the path of the currently executing file (script or module). This is accidentally the same as the script if it is accessed from the script! If you want to put useful things like locating resource files relative to the script location into a library, then you must use sys.argv[0].
Example:
C:\junk\so>type \junk\so\scriptpath\script1.py
import sys, os
print "script: sys.argv[0] is", repr(sys.argv[0])
print "script: __file__ is", repr(__file__)
print "script: cwd is", repr(os.getcwd())
import whereutils
whereutils.show_where()
C:\junk\so>type \python26\lib\site-packages\whereutils.py
import sys, os
def show_where():
print "show_where: sys.argv[0] is", repr(sys.argv[0])
print "show_where: __file__ is", repr(__file__)
print "show_where: cwd is", repr(os.getcwd())
C:\junk\so>\python26\python scriptpath\script1.py
script: sys.argv[0] is 'scriptpath\\script1.py'
script: __file__ is 'scriptpath\\script1.py'
script: cwd is 'C:\\junk\\so'
show_where: sys.argv[0] is 'scriptpath\\script1.py'
show_where: __file__ is 'C:\\python26\\lib\\site-packages\\whereutils.pyc'
show_where: cwd is 'C:\\junk\\so'
This will print the directory in which the script lives (as opposed to the working directory):
import os
dirname, filename = os.path.split(os.path.abspath(__file__))
print "running from", dirname
print "file is", filename
Here's how it behaves, when I put it in c:\src:
> cd c:\src
> python so-where.py
running from C:\src
file is so-where.py
> cd c:\
> python src\so-where.py
running from C:\src
file is so-where.py
import sys, os
file = sys.argv[0]
pathname = os.path.dirname(file)
print 'running from %s' % os.path.abspath(pathname)
print 'file is %s' % file
Check os.getcwd() (docs)
The running file is always __file__.
Here's a demo script, named identify.py
print __file__
Here's the results
MacBook-5:Projects slott$ python StackOverflow/identify.py
StackOverflow/identify.py
MacBook-5:Projects slott$ cd StackOverflow/
MacBook-5:StackOverflow slott$ python identify.py
identify.py
I would suggest
import os, sys
print os.path.split(os.path.abspath(os.path.realpath(sys.argv[0])))[0]
This way you can safely create symbolic links to the script executable and it will still find the correct directory.
The script name will (always?) be the first index of sys.argv:
import sys
print sys.argv[0]
An even easier way to find the path of your running script:
os.path.dirname(sys.argv[0])
The directory of the script which python is executing is added to sys.path
This is actually an array (list) which contains other paths.
The first element contains the full path where the script is located (for windows).
Therefore, for windows, one can use:
import sys
path = sys.path[0]
print(path)
Others have suggested using sys.argv[0] which works in a very similar way and is complete.
import sys
path = os.path.dirname(sys.argv[0])
print(path)
Note that sys.argv[0] contains the full working directory (path) + filename whereas sys.path[0] is the current working directory without the filename.
I have tested sys.path[0] on windows and it works. I have not tested on other operating systems outside of windows, so somebody may wish to comment on this.
Aside from the aforementioned sys.argv[0], it is also possible to use the __main__:
import __main__
print(__main__.__file__)
Beware, however, this is only useful in very rare circumstances;
and it always creates an import loop, meaning that the __main__ will not be fully executed at that moment.
I don't think this has been asked before-I have a folder that has lots of different .py files. The script I've made only uses some-but some call others & I don't know all the ones being used. Is there a program that will get everything needed to make that script run into one folder?
Cheers!
Use the modulefinder module in the standard library, see e.g. http://docs.python.org/library/modulefinder.html
# zipmod.py - make a zip archive consisting of Python modules and their dependencies as reported by modulefinder
# To use: cd to the directory containing your Python module tree and type
# $ python zipmod.py archive.zip mod1.py mod2.py ...
# Only modules in the current working directory and its subdirectories will be included.
# Written and tested on Mac OS X, but it should work on other platforms with minimal modifications.
import modulefinder
import os
import sys
import zipfile
def main(output, *mnames):
mf = modulefinder.ModuleFinder()
for mname in mnames:
mf.run_script(mname)
cwd = os.getcwd()
zf = zipfile.ZipFile(output, 'w')
for mod in mf.modules.itervalues():
if not mod.__file__:
continue
modfile = os.path.abspath(mod.__file__)
if os.path.commonprefix([cwd, modfile]) == cwd:
zf.write(modfile, os.path.relpath(modfile))
zf.close()
if __name__ == '__main__':
main(*sys.argv[1:])
Freeze does pretty close to what you describe. It does an extra step of generating C files to create a stand-alone executable, but you could use the log output it produces to get the list of modules your script uses. From there it's a simple matter to copy them all into a directory to be zipped up
(or whatever).
I want to detect whether module has changed. Now, using inotify is simple, you just need to know the directory you want to get notifications from.
How do I retrieve a module's path in python?
import a_module
print(a_module.__file__)
Will actually give you the path to the .pyc file that was loaded, at least on Mac OS X. So I guess you can do:
import os
path = os.path.abspath(a_module.__file__)
You can also try:
path = os.path.dirname(a_module.__file__)
To get the module's directory.
There is inspect module in python.
Official documentation
The inspect module provides several useful functions to help get
information about live objects such as modules, classes, methods,
functions, tracebacks, frame objects, and code objects. For example,
it can help you examine the contents of a class, retrieve the source
code of a method, extract and format the argument list for a function,
or get all the information you need to display a detailed traceback.
Example:
>>> import os
>>> import inspect
>>> inspect.getfile(os)
'/usr/lib64/python2.7/os.pyc'
>>> inspect.getfile(inspect)
'/usr/lib64/python2.7/inspect.pyc'
>>> os.path.dirname(inspect.getfile(inspect))
'/usr/lib64/python2.7'
As the other answers have said, the best way to do this is with __file__ (demonstrated again below). However, there is an important caveat, which is that __file__ does NOT exist if you are running the module on its own (i.e. as __main__).
For example, say you have two files (both of which are on your PYTHONPATH):
#/path1/foo.py
import bar
print(bar.__file__)
and
#/path2/bar.py
import os
print(os.getcwd())
print(__file__)
Running foo.py will give the output:
/path1 # "import bar" causes the line "print(os.getcwd())" to run
/path2/bar.py # then "print(__file__)" runs
/path2/bar.py # then the import statement finishes and "print(bar.__file__)" runs
HOWEVER if you try to run bar.py on its own, you will get:
/path2 # "print(os.getcwd())" still works fine
Traceback (most recent call last): # but __file__ doesn't exist if bar.py is running as main
File "/path2/bar.py", line 3, in <module>
print(__file__)
NameError: name '__file__' is not defined
Hope this helps. This caveat cost me a lot of time and confusion while testing the other solutions presented.
I will try tackling a few variations on this question as well:
finding the path of the called script
finding the path of the currently executing script
finding the directory of the called script
(Some of these questions have been asked on SO, but have been closed as duplicates and redirected here.)
Caveats of Using __file__
For a module that you have imported:
import something
something.__file__
will return the absolute path of the module. However, given the folowing script foo.py:
#foo.py
print '__file__', __file__
Calling it with 'python foo.py' Will return simply 'foo.py'. If you add a shebang:
#!/usr/bin/python
#foo.py
print '__file__', __file__
and call it using ./foo.py, it will return './foo.py'. Calling it from a different directory, (eg put foo.py in directory bar), then calling either
python bar/foo.py
or adding a shebang and executing the file directly:
bar/foo.py
will return 'bar/foo.py' (the relative path).
Finding the directory
Now going from there to get the directory, os.path.dirname(__file__) can also be tricky. At least on my system, it returns an empty string if you call it from the same directory as the file. ex.
# foo.py
import os
print '__file__ is:', __file__
print 'os.path.dirname(__file__) is:', os.path.dirname(__file__)
will output:
__file__ is: foo.py
os.path.dirname(__file__) is:
In other words, it returns an empty string, so this does not seem reliable if you want to use it for the current file (as opposed to the file of an imported module). To get around this, you can wrap it in a call to abspath:
# foo.py
import os
print 'os.path.abspath(__file__) is:', os.path.abspath(__file__)
print 'os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__)) is:', os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__))
which outputs something like:
os.path.abspath(__file__) is: /home/user/bar/foo.py
os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__)) is: /home/user/bar
Note that abspath() does NOT resolve symlinks. If you want to do this, use realpath() instead. For example, making a symlink file_import_testing_link pointing to file_import_testing.py, with the following content:
import os
print 'abspath(__file__)',os.path.abspath(__file__)
print 'realpath(__file__)',os.path.realpath(__file__)
executing will print absolute paths something like:
abspath(__file__) /home/user/file_test_link
realpath(__file__) /home/user/file_test.py
file_import_testing_link -> file_import_testing.py
Using inspect
#SummerBreeze mentions using the inspect module.
This seems to work well, and is quite concise, for imported modules:
import os
import inspect
print 'inspect.getfile(os) is:', inspect.getfile(os)
obediently returns the absolute path. For finding the path of the currently executing script:
inspect.getfile(inspect.currentframe())
(thanks #jbochi)
inspect.getabsfile(inspect.currentframe())
gives the absolute path of currently executing script (thanks #Sadman_Sakib).
I don't get why no one is talking about this, but to me the simplest solution is using imp.find_module("modulename") (documentation here):
import imp
imp.find_module("os")
It gives a tuple with the path in second position:
(<open file '/usr/lib/python2.7/os.py', mode 'U' at 0x7f44528d7540>,
'/usr/lib/python2.7/os.py',
('.py', 'U', 1))
The advantage of this method over the "inspect" one is that you don't need to import the module to make it work, and you can use a string in input. Useful when checking modules called in another script for example.
EDIT:
In python3, importlib module should do:
Doc of importlib.util.find_spec:
Return the spec for the specified module.
First, sys.modules is checked to see if the module was already imported. If so, then sys.modules[name].spec is returned. If that happens to be
set to None, then ValueError is raised. If the module is not in
sys.modules, then sys.meta_path is searched for a suitable spec with the
value of 'path' given to the finders. None is returned if no spec could
be found.
If the name is for submodule (contains a dot), the parent module is
automatically imported.
The name and package arguments work the same as importlib.import_module().
In other words, relative module names (with leading dots) work.
This was trivial.
Each module has a __file__ variable that shows its relative path from where you are right now.
Therefore, getting a directory for the module to notify it is simple as:
os.path.dirname(__file__)
import os
path = os.path.abspath(__file__)
dir_path = os.path.dirname(path)
import module
print module.__path__
Packages support one more special attribute, __path__. This is
initialized to be a list containing the name of the directory holding
the package’s __init__.py before the code in that file is executed.
This variable can be modified; doing so affects future searches for
modules and subpackages contained in the package.
While this feature is not often needed, it can be used to extend the
set of modules found in a package.
Source
If you want to retrieve the module path without loading it:
import importlib.util
print(importlib.util.find_spec("requests").origin)
Example output:
/usr/lib64/python3.9/site-packages/requests/__init__.py
Command Line Utility
You can tweak it to a command line utility,
python-which <package name>
Create /usr/local/bin/python-which
#!/usr/bin/env python
import importlib
import os
import sys
args = sys.argv[1:]
if len(args) > 0:
module = importlib.import_module(args[0])
print os.path.dirname(module.__file__)
Make it executable
sudo chmod +x /usr/local/bin/python-which
you can just import your module
then hit its name and you'll get its full path
>>> import os
>>> os
<module 'os' from 'C:\\Users\\Hassan Ashraf\\AppData\\Local\\Programs\\Python\\Python36-32\\lib\\os.py'>
>>>
So I spent a fair amount of time trying to do this with py2exe
The problem was to get the base folder of the script whether it was being run as a python script or as a py2exe executable. Also to have it work whether it was being run from the current folder, another folder or (this was the hardest) from the system's path.
Eventually I used this approach, using sys.frozen as an indicator of running in py2exe:
import os,sys
if hasattr(sys,'frozen'): # only when running in py2exe this exists
base = sys.prefix
else: # otherwise this is a regular python script
base = os.path.dirname(os.path.realpath(__file__))
If you want to retrieve the package's root path from any of its modules, the following works (tested on Python 3.6):
from . import __path__ as ROOT_PATH
print(ROOT_PATH)
The main __init__.py path can also be referenced by using __file__ instead.
Hope this helps!
When you import a module, yo have access to plenty of information. Check out dir(a_module). As for the path, there is a dunder for that: a_module.__path__. You can also just print the module itself.
>>> import a_module
>>> print(dir(a_module))
['__builtins__', '__cached__', '__doc__', '__file__', '__loader__', '__name__', '__package__', '__path__', '__spec__']
>>> print(a_module.__path__)
['/.../.../a_module']
>>> print(a_module)
<module 'a_module' from '/.../.../a_module/__init__.py'>
If you would like to know absolute path from your script you can use Path object:
from pathlib import Path
print(Path().absolute())
print(Path().resolve('.'))
print(Path().cwd())
cwd() method
Return a new path object representing the current directory (as returned by os.getcwd())
resolve() method
Make the path absolute, resolving any symlinks. A new path object is returned:
If you installed it using pip, "pip show" works great ('Location')
$ pip show detectron2
Name: detectron2
Version: 0.1
Summary: Detectron2 is FAIR next-generation research platform for object detection and segmentation.
Home-page: https://github.com/facebookresearch/detectron2
Author: FAIR
Author-email: None
License: UNKNOWN
Location: /home/ubuntu/anaconda3/envs/pytorch_p36/lib/python3.6/site-packages
Requires: yacs, tabulate, tqdm, pydot, tensorboard, Pillow, termcolor, future, cloudpickle, matplotlib, fvcore
Update:
$ python -m pip show mymodule
(author: wisbucky)
If the only caveat of using __file__ is when current, relative directory is blank (ie, when running as a script from the same directory where the script is), then a trivial solution is:
import os.path
mydir = os.path.dirname(__file__) or '.'
full = os.path.abspath(mydir)
print __file__, mydir, full
And the result:
$ python teste.py
teste.py . /home/user/work/teste
The trick is in or '.' after the dirname() call. It sets the dir as ., which means current directory and is a valid directory for any path-related function.
Thus, using abspath() is not truly needed. But if you use it anyway, the trick is not needed: abspath() accepts blank paths and properly interprets it as the current directory.
I'd like to contribute with one common scenario (in Python 3) and explore a few approaches to it.
The built-in function open() accepts either relative or absolute path as its first argument. The relative path is treated as relative to the current working directory though so it is recommended to pass the absolute path to the file.
Simply said, if you run a script file with the following code, it is not guaranteed that the example.txt file will be created in the same directory where the script file is located:
with open('example.txt', 'w'):
pass
To fix this code we need to get the path to the script and make it absolute. To ensure the path to be absolute we simply use the os.path.realpath() function. To get the path to the script there are several common functions that return various path results:
os.getcwd()
os.path.realpath('example.txt')
sys.argv[0]
__file__
Both functions os.getcwd() and os.path.realpath() return path results based on the current working directory. Generally not what we want. The first element of the sys.argv list is the path of the root script (the script you run) regardless of whether you call the list in the root script itself or in any of its modules. It might come handy in some situations. The __file__ variable contains path of the module from which it has been called.
The following code correctly creates a file example.txt in the same directory where the script is located:
filedir = os.path.dirname(os.path.realpath(__file__))
filepath = os.path.join(filedir, 'example.txt')
with open(filepath, 'w'):
pass
From within modules of a python package I had to refer to a file that resided in the same directory as package. Ex.
some_dir/
maincli.py
top_package/
__init__.py
level_one_a/
__init__.py
my_lib_a.py
level_two/
__init__.py
hello_world.py
level_one_b/
__init__.py
my_lib_b.py
So in above I had to call maincli.py from my_lib_a.py module knowing that top_package and maincli.py are in the same directory. Here's how I get the path to maincli.py:
import sys
import os
import imp
class ConfigurationException(Exception):
pass
# inside of my_lib_a.py
def get_maincli_path():
maincli_path = os.path.abspath(imp.find_module('maincli')[1])
# top_package = __package__.split('.')[0]
# mod = sys.modules.get(top_package)
# modfile = mod.__file__
# pkg_in_dir = os.path.dirname(os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(modfile)))
# maincli_path = os.path.join(pkg_in_dir, 'maincli.py')
if not os.path.exists(maincli_path):
err_msg = 'This script expects that "maincli.py" be installed to the '\
'same directory: "{0}"'.format(maincli_path)
raise ConfigurationException(err_msg)
return maincli_path
Based on posting by PlasmaBinturong I modified the code.
If you wish to do this dynamically in a "program" try this code:
My point is, you may not know the exact name of the module to "hardcode" it.
It may be selected from a list or may not be currently running to use __file__.
(I know, it will not work in Python 3)
global modpath
modname = 'os' #This can be any module name on the fly
#Create a file called "modname.py"
f=open("modname.py","w")
f.write("import "+modname+"\n")
f.write("modpath = "+modname+"\n")
f.close()
#Call the file with execfile()
execfile('modname.py')
print modpath
<module 'os' from 'C:\Python27\lib\os.pyc'>
I tried to get rid of the "global" issue but found cases where it did not work
I think "execfile()" can be emulated in Python 3
Since this is in a program, it can easily be put in a method or module for reuse.
Here is a quick bash script in case it's useful to anyone. I just want to be able to set an environment variable so that I can pushd to the code.
#!/bin/bash
module=${1:?"I need a module name"}
python << EOI
import $module
import os
print os.path.dirname($module.__file__)
EOI
Shell example:
[root#sri-4625-0004 ~]# export LXML=$(get_python_path.sh lxml)
[root#sri-4625-0004 ~]# echo $LXML
/usr/lib64/python2.7/site-packages/lxml
[root#sri-4625-0004 ~]#
If your import is a site-package (e.g. pandas) I recommend this to get its directory (does not work if import is a module, like e.g. pathlib):
from importlib import resources # part of core Python
import pandas as pd
package_dir = resources.path(package=pd, resource="").__enter__()
In general importlib.resources can be considered when a task is about accessing paths/resources of a site package.
If you used pip, then you can call pip show, but you must call it using the specific version of python that you are using. For example, these could all give different results:
$ python -m pip show numpy
$ python2.7 -m pip show numpy
$ python3 -m pip show numpy
Location: /System/Library/Frameworks/Python.framework/Versions/2.7/Extras/lib/python
Don't simply run $ pip show numpy, because there is no guarantee that it will be the same pip that different python versions are calling.
I have scripts calling other script files but I need to get the filepath of the file that is currently running within the process.
For example, let's say I have three files. Using execfile:
script_1.py calls script_2.py.
In turn, script_2.py calls script_3.py.
How can I get the file name and path of script_3.py, from code within script_3.py, without having to pass that information as arguments from script_2.py?
(Executing os.getcwd() returns the original starting script's filepath not the current file's.)
__file__
as others have said. You may also want to use os.path.realpath to eliminate symlinks:
import os
os.path.realpath(__file__)
p1.py:
execfile("p2.py")
p2.py:
import inspect, os
print (inspect.getfile(inspect.currentframe())) # script filename (usually with path)
print (os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(inspect.getfile(inspect.currentframe())))) # script directory
Update 2018-11-28:
Here is a summary of experiments with Python 2 and 3. With
main.py - runs foo.py
foo.py - runs lib/bar.py
lib/bar.py - prints filepath expressions
| Python | Run statement | Filepath expression |
|--------+---------------------+----------------------------------------|
| 2 | execfile | os.path.abspath(inspect.stack()[0][1]) |
| 2 | from lib import bar | __file__ |
| 3 | exec | (wasn't able to obtain it) |
| 3 | import lib.bar | __file__ |
For Python 2, it might be clearer to switch to packages so can use from lib import bar - just add empty __init__.py files to the two folders.
For Python 3, execfile doesn't exist - the nearest alternative is exec(open(<filename>).read()), though this affects the stack frames. It's simplest to just use import foo and import lib.bar - no __init__.py files needed.
See also Difference between import and execfile
Original Answer:
Here is an experiment based on the answers in this thread - with Python 2.7.10 on Windows.
The stack-based ones are the only ones that seem to give reliable results. The last two have the shortest syntax, i.e. -
print os.path.abspath(inspect.stack()[0][1]) # C:\filepaths\lib\bar.py
print os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(inspect.stack()[0][1])) # C:\filepaths\lib
Here's to these being added to sys as functions! Credit to #Usagi and #pablog
Based on the following three files, and running main.py from its folder with python main.py (also tried execfiles with absolute paths and calling from a separate folder).
C:\filepaths\main.py: execfile('foo.py')
C:\filepaths\foo.py: execfile('lib/bar.py')
C:\filepaths\lib\bar.py:
import sys
import os
import inspect
print "Python " + sys.version
print
print __file__ # main.py
print sys.argv[0] # main.py
print inspect.stack()[0][1] # lib/bar.py
print sys.path[0] # C:\filepaths
print
print os.path.realpath(__file__) # C:\filepaths\main.py
print os.path.abspath(__file__) # C:\filepaths\main.py
print os.path.basename(__file__) # main.py
print os.path.basename(os.path.realpath(sys.argv[0])) # main.py
print
print sys.path[0] # C:\filepaths
print os.path.abspath(os.path.split(sys.argv[0])[0]) # C:\filepaths
print os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__)) # C:\filepaths
print os.path.dirname(os.path.realpath(sys.argv[0])) # C:\filepaths
print os.path.dirname(__file__) # (empty string)
print
print inspect.getfile(inspect.currentframe()) # lib/bar.py
print os.path.abspath(inspect.getfile(inspect.currentframe())) # C:\filepaths\lib\bar.py
print os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(inspect.getfile(inspect.currentframe()))) # C:\filepaths\lib
print
print os.path.abspath(inspect.stack()[0][1]) # C:\filepaths\lib\bar.py
print os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(inspect.stack()[0][1])) # C:\filepaths\lib
print
I think this is cleaner:
import inspect
print inspect.stack()[0][1]
and gets the same information as:
print inspect.getfile(inspect.currentframe())
Where [0] is the current frame in the stack (top of stack) and [1] is for the file name, increase to go backwards in the stack i.e.
print inspect.stack()[1][1]
would be the file name of the script that called the current frame. Also, using [-1] will get you to the bottom of the stack, the original calling script.
import os
os.path.dirname(__file__) # relative directory path
os.path.abspath(__file__) # absolute file path
os.path.basename(__file__) # the file name only
The suggestions marked as best are all true if your script consists of only one file.
If you want to find out the name of the executable (i.e. the root file passed to the python interpreter for the current program) from a file that may be imported as a module, you need to do this (let's assume this is in a file named foo.py):
import inspect
print inspect.stack()[-1][1]
Because the last thing ([-1]) on the stack is the first thing that went into it (stacks are LIFO/FILO data structures).
Then in file bar.py if you import foo it'll print bar.py, rather than foo.py, which would be the value of all of these:
__file__
inspect.getfile(inspect.currentframe())
inspect.stack()[0][1]
Since Python 3 is fairly mainstream, I wanted to include a pathlib answer, as I believe that it is probably now a better tool for accessing file and path information.
from pathlib import Path
current_file: Path = Path(__file__).resolve()
If you are seeking the directory of the current file, it is as easy as adding .parent to the Path() statement:
current_path: Path = Path(__file__).parent.resolve()
It's not entirely clear what you mean by "the filepath of the file that is currently running within the process".
sys.argv[0] usually contains the location of the script that was invoked by the Python interpreter.
Check the sys documentation for more details.
As #Tim and #Pat Notz have pointed out, the __file__ attribute provides access to
the file from which the module was
loaded, if it was loaded from a file
import os
print os.path.basename(__file__)
this will give us the filename only. i.e. if abspath of file is c:\abcd\abc.py then 2nd line will print abc.py
I have a script that must work under windows environment.
This code snipped is what I've finished with:
import os,sys
PROJECT_PATH = os.path.abspath(os.path.split(sys.argv[0])[0])
it's quite a hacky decision. But it requires no external libraries and it's the most important thing in my case.
Try this,
import os
os.path.dirname(os.path.realpath(__file__))
import os
os.path.dirname(os.path.abspath(__file__))
No need for inspect or any other library.
This worked for me when I had to import a script (from a different directory then the executed script), that used a configuration file residing in the same folder as the imported script.
The __file__ attribute works for both the file containing the main execution code as well as imported modules.
See https://web.archive.org/web/20090918095828/http://pyref.infogami.com/__file__
import sys
print sys.path[0]
this would print the path of the currently executing script
I think it's just __file__ Sounds like you may also want to checkout the inspect module.
You can use inspect.stack()
import inspect,os
inspect.stack()[0] => (<frame object at 0x00AC2AC0>, 'g:\\Python\\Test\\_GetCurrentProgram.py', 15, '<module>', ['print inspect.stack()[0]\n'], 0)
os.path.abspath (inspect.stack()[0][1]) => 'g:\\Python\\Test\\_GetCurrentProgram.py'
import sys
print sys.argv[0]
print(__file__)
print(__import__("pathlib").Path(__file__).parent)
This should work:
import os,sys
filename=os.path.basename(os.path.realpath(sys.argv[0]))
dirname=os.path.dirname(os.path.realpath(sys.argv[0]))
Here is what I use so I can throw my code anywhere without issue. __name__ is always defined, but __file__ is only defined when the code is run as a file (e.g. not in IDLE/iPython).
if '__file__' in globals():
self_name = globals()['__file__']
elif '__file__' in locals():
self_name = locals()['__file__']
else:
self_name = __name__
Alternatively, this can be written as:
self_name = globals().get('__file__', locals().get('__file__', __name__))
To get directory of executing script
print os.path.dirname( inspect.getfile(inspect.currentframe()))
I used the approach with __file__
os.path.abspath(__file__)
but there is a little trick, it returns the .py file
when the code is run the first time,
next runs give the name of *.pyc file
so I stayed with:
inspect.getfile(inspect.currentframe())
or
sys._getframe().f_code.co_filename
I wrote a function which take into account eclipse debugger and unittest.
It return the folder of the first script you launch. You can optionally specify the __file__ var, but the main thing is that you don't have to share this variable across all your calling hierarchy.
Maybe you can handle others stack particular cases I didn't see, but for me it's ok.
import inspect, os
def getRootDirectory(_file_=None):
"""
Get the directory of the root execution file
Can help: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/50499/how-do-i-get-the-path-and-name-of-the-file-that-is-currently-executing
For eclipse user with unittest or debugger, the function search for the correct folder in the stack
You can pass __file__ (with 4 underscores) if you want the caller directory
"""
# If we don't have the __file__ :
if _file_ is None:
# We get the last :
rootFile = inspect.stack()[-1][1]
folder = os.path.abspath(rootFile)
# If we use unittest :
if ("/pysrc" in folder) & ("org.python.pydev" in folder):
previous = None
# We search from left to right the case.py :
for el in inspect.stack():
currentFile = os.path.abspath(el[1])
if ("unittest/case.py" in currentFile) | ("org.python.pydev" in currentFile):
break
previous = currentFile
folder = previous
# We return the folder :
return os.path.dirname(folder)
else:
# We return the folder according to specified __file__ :
return os.path.dirname(os.path.realpath(_file_))
Simplest way is:
in script_1.py:
import subprocess
subprocess.call(['python3',<path_to_script_2.py>])
in script_2.py:
sys.argv[0]
P.S.: I've tried execfile, but since it reads script_2.py as a string, sys.argv[0] returned <string>.
The following returns the path where your current main script is located at. I tested this with Linux, Win10, IPython and Jupyter Lab. I needed a solution that works for local Jupyter notebooks as well.
import builtins
import os
import sys
def current_dir():
if "get_ipython" in globals() or "get_ipython" in dir(builtins):
# os.getcwd() is PROBABLY the dir that hosts the active notebook script.
# See also https://github.com/ipython/ipython/issues/10123
return os.getcwd()
else:
return os.path.abspath(os.path.dirname(sys.argv[0]))
Finding the home directory of the path in which your Python script resides
As an addendum to the other answers already here (and not answering the OP's question, since other answers already do that), if the path to your script is /home/gabriel/GS/dev/eRCaGuy_dotfiles/useful_scripts/cpu_logger.py, and you wish to obtain the home directory part of that path, which is /home/gabriel, you can do this:
import os
# Obtain the home dir of the user in whose home directory this script resides
script_path_list = os.path.normpath(__file__).split(os.sep)
home_dir = os.path.join("/", script_path_list[1], script_path_list[2])
To help make sense of this, here are the paths for __file__, script_path_list, and home_dir. Notice that script_path_list is a list of the path components, with the first element being an empty string since it originally contained the / root dir path separator for this Linux path:
__file__ = /home/gabriel/GS/dev/eRCaGuy_dotfiles/useful_scripts/cpu_logger.py
script_path_list = ['', 'home', 'gabriel', 'GS', 'dev', 'eRCaGuy_dotfiles', 'useful_scripts', 'cpu_logger.py']
home_dir = /home/gabriel
Source:
Python: obtain the path to the home directory of the user in whose directory the script being run is located [duplicate]