Python Programming for Biology: Bioinformatics and Beyond

The ‘

os.path

’ sub-module

The  sub-module  os.path  contains  further  functionality  that  applies  to  file-system  paths.

The  term  path  refers  to  a  particular  location  of  a  file,  directory  or  link  within  the

hierarchical organisation of a file system, e.g. on a hard disk or DVD. All the functionality

presented  here  works  on  strings  to  represent  the  file-system  paths,  e.g.

‘/home/user/file.py’.  Given  that  Python  strings  are  immutable,  the  relevant  methods  will

generate new path strings etc. rather than modify existing ones. All of the examples below

assume  the  appropriate  import  has  been  made  in  the  form:  from  os.path  import  method,

although  we  do  not  mean  to  preclude  other  import  styles.  From  Python  3.4  there  is  a

module, pathlib, which provides an object-oriented approach to file paths.