from the desk of stinkpot

create a directory in python

July 18th, 2006 by Lawrence David

assuming you’re running some *nix (including mac os x), here’s how to create a directory from within a python script. note that we need to check if the directory exists before creating a directory (if you try and overwrite a directory, python will throw an error).

here goes:

import os;
…
dirname = “my_dir_name”
if not os.path.isdir(“./” + dirname + “/”):
os.mkdir(“./” + dirname + “/”)

note that the last line needs to be indented (silly blogger won’t let me indent that line!)

Posted in Python | 14 Comments »

if that was helpful ...

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14 Responses to “create a directory in python”

1. on 24 Mar 2008 at 12:08 am   Chris Nicholls

   Hey, I randomly found this page on google the other day when I was working on some python stuff. This post helped. Thanks.

   But what i actually wanted to comment on was the header at the top of your theme. I think it’s fantastic. Way to go.

   Cheers

2. on 24 Mar 2008 at 7:27 am   Lawrence David

   it’s what happens when you’ve got too much time on your hands during 1st year of grad school

3. on 11 Jun 2008 at 12:22 pm   Slava

   Super!!!

4. on 01 Jan 2009 at 8:00 pm   Create Directory in Python « Always Get Better

   [...] needed to learn how to create directories using Python and found this great resource (digression: check out this author’s page headers – way [...]

5. on 15 May 2009 at 11:13 am   Eric Wendelin

   Thanks a bunch, this is exactly what I was looking for.

6. on 30 Jul 2009 at 8:02 pm   Aman Aggarwal

   Thanks!

7. on 02 Sep 2009 at 8:22 am   NT

   Nearly 18 months on I have to echo the first commenter’s thoughts – totally cool header.

8. on 13 Sep 2009 at 11:00 pm   Matthew

   This also works on Windows unchanged, but like it better like this:

   [code]
   dirname = "my_dir_name"
   if not os.path.isdir(os.path.join(os.getcwd(), dirname)):
   os.mkdir(os.path.join(os.getcwd(), dirname))
   [/code]

   My $0.02. Nice site BTW.

9. on 17 Jan 2010 at 12:51 pm   Graham

   Thanks exactly what I was looking for. Modified Matthew’s code slightly to incorporate recursive directory creation.

   #code
   import os;

   dirname = “mydir”
   if not os.path.isdir(os.path.join(os.getcwd(), dirname)):
   os.makedirs(os.path.join(os.getcwd(), dirname))
   print os.getcwd()

10. on 22 Jan 2010 at 6:00 am   nikunj

    Hey, Many thnx for this useful post..!!

11. on 28 Jul 2011 at 10:01 am   Saurabh

    this is simply.
    exactly what i was looking for.

12. on 28 Jul 2011 at 10:03 am   Saurabh

    can you guide me how to create a Remote Directory ?

13. on 22 Sep 2011 at 2:54 pm   Shruti

    Cool Story Bro! super cool banner!

14. on 11 Aug 2012 at 5:41 am   Sanket

    Thanks a lot it helped me.