`os` — Miscellaneous operating system interfaces¶

Source code: Lib/os.py

This module provides a portable way of using operating system dependent functionality. If you just want to read or write a file see open(), if you want to manipulate paths, see the os.path module, and if you want to read all the lines in all the files on the command line see the fileinput module. For creating temporary files and directories see the tempfile module, and for high-level file and directory handling see the shutil module.

Notes on the availability of these functions:

The design of all built-in operating system dependent modules of Python is such that as long as the same functionality is available, it uses the same interface; for example, the function os.stat(path) returns stat information about path in the same format (which happens to have originated with the POSIX interface).
Extensions peculiar to a particular operating system are also available through the os module, but using them is of course a threat to portability.
All functions accepting path or file names accept both bytes and string objects, and result in an object of the same type, if a path or file name is returned.
On VxWorks, os.popen, os.fork, os.execv and os.spawn*p* are not supported.
On WebAssembly platforms, Android and iOS, large parts of the os module are not available or behave differently. APIs related to processes (e.g. fork(), execve()) and resources (e.g. nice()) are not available. Others like getuid() and getpid() are emulated or stubs. WebAssembly platforms also lack support for signals (e.g. kill(), wait()).

Note

All functions in this module raise OSError (or subclasses thereof) in the case of invalid or inaccessible file names and paths, or other arguments that have the correct type, but are not accepted by the operating system.

exception os.error¶: An alias for the built-in OSError exception.

os.name¶: The name of the operating system dependent module imported. The following names have currently been registered: 'posix', 'nt', 'java'.

See also

sys.platform has a finer granularity. os.uname() gives system-dependent version information.

The platform module provides detailed checks for the system’s identity.

File Names, Command Line Arguments, and Environment Variables¶

In Python, file names, command line arguments, and environment variables are represented using the string type. On some systems, decoding these strings to and from bytes is necessary before passing them to the operating system. Python uses the filesystem encoding and error handler to perform this conversion (see sys.getfilesystemencoding()).

The filesystem encoding and error handler are configured at Python startup by the PyConfig_Read() function: see filesystem_encoding and filesystem_errors members of PyConfig.

Changed in version 3.1: On some systems, conversion using the file system encoding may fail. In this case, Python uses the surrogateescape encoding error handler, which means that undecodable bytes are replaced by a Unicode character U+DCxx on decoding, and these are again translated to the original byte on encoding.

The file system encoding must guarantee to successfully decode all bytes below 128. If the file system encoding fails to provide this guarantee, API functions can raise UnicodeError.

Python UTF-8 Mode¶

Added in version 3.7: See PEP 540 for more details.

The Python UTF-8 Mode ignores the locale encoding and forces the usage of the UTF-8 encoding:

Use UTF-8 as the filesystem encoding.
sys.getfilesystemencoding() returns 'utf-8'.
locale.getpreferredencoding() returns 'utf-8' (the do_setlocale argument has no effect).
sys.stdin, sys.stdout, and sys.stderr all use UTF-8 as their text encoding, with the surrogateescape error handler being enabled for sys.stdin and sys.stdout (sys.stderr continues to use backslashreplace as it does in the default locale-aware mode)
On Unix, os.device_encoding() returns 'utf-8' rather than the device encoding.

Note that the standard stream settings in UTF-8 mode can be overridden by PYTHONIOENCODING (just as they can be in the default locale-aware mode).

As a consequence of the changes in those lower level APIs, other higher level APIs also exhibit different default behaviours:

Command line arguments, environment variables and filenames are decoded to text using the UTF-8 encoding.
os.fsdecode() and os.fsencode() use the UTF-8 encoding.
open(), io.open(), and codecs.open() use the UTF-8 encoding by default. However, they still use the strict error handler by default so that attempting to open a binary file in text mode is likely to raise an exception rather than producing nonsense data.

The Python UTF-8 Mode is enabled if the LC_CTYPE locale is C or POSIX at Python startup (see the PyConfig_Read() function).

It can be enabled or disabled using the -X utf8 command line option and the PYTHONUTF8 environment variable.

If the PYTHONUTF8 environment variable is not set at all, then the interpreter defaults to using the current locale settings, unless the current locale is identified as a legacy ASCII-based locale (as described for PYTHONCOERCECLOCALE), and locale coercion is either disabled or fails. In such legacy locales, the interpreter will default to enabling UTF-8 mode unless explicitly instructed not to do so.

The Python UTF-8 Mode can only be enabled at the Python startup. Its value can be read from sys.flags.utf8_mode.

See also

PEP 686: Python 3.15 will make Python UTF-8 Mode default.

Process Parameters¶

These functions and data items provide information and operate on the current process and user.

os.ctermid()¶: Return the filename corresponding to the controlling terminal of the process.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.environ¶

A mapping object where keys and values are strings that represent the process environment. For example, environ['HOME'] is the pathname of your home directory (on some platforms), and is equivalent to getenv("HOME") in C.

This mapping is captured the first time the os module is imported, typically during Python startup as part of processing site.py. Changes to the environment made after this time are not reflected in os.environ, except for changes made by modifying os.environ directly.

This mapping may be used to modify the environment as well as query the environment. putenv() will be called automatically when the mapping is modified.

On Unix, keys and values use sys.getfilesystemencoding() and 'surrogateescape' error handler. Use environb if you would like to use a different encoding.

On Windows, the keys are converted to uppercase. This also applies when getting, setting, or deleting an item. For example, environ['monty'] = 'python' maps the key 'MONTY' to the value 'python'.

Note

Calling putenv() directly does not change os.environ, so it’s better to modify os.environ.

Note

On some platforms, including FreeBSD and macOS, setting environ may cause memory leaks. Refer to the system documentation for putenv().

You can delete items in this mapping to unset environment variables. unsetenv() will be called automatically when an item is deleted from os.environ, and when one of the pop() or clear() methods is called.

Changed in version 3.9: Updated to support PEP 584’s merge (|) and update (|=) operators.

os.environb¶

Bytes version of environ: a mapping object where both keys and values are bytes objects representing the process environment. environ and environb are synchronized (modifying environb updates environ, and vice versa).

environb is only available if supports_bytes_environ is True.

Added in version 3.2.

Changed in version 3.9: Updated to support PEP 584’s merge (|) and update (|=) operators.

os.chdir(path)
os.fchdir(fd)
os.getcwd(): These functions are described in Files and Directories.

os.fsencode(filename)¶

Encode path-like filename to the filesystem encoding and error handler; return bytes unchanged.

fsdecode() is the reverse function.

Added in version 3.2.

Changed in version 3.6: Support added to accept objects implementing the os.PathLike interface.

os.fsdecode(filename)¶

Decode the path-like filename from the filesystem encoding and error handler; return str unchanged.

fsencode() is the reverse function.

Added in version 3.2.

Changed in version 3.6: Support added to accept objects implementing the os.PathLike interface.

os.fspath(path)¶

Return the file system representation of the path.

If str or bytes is passed in, it is returned unchanged. Otherwise __fspath__() is called and its value is returned as long as it is a str or bytes object. In all other cases, TypeError is raised.

Added in version 3.6.

class os.PathLike¶

An abstract base class for objects representing a file system path, e.g. pathlib.PurePath.

Added in version 3.6.

abstractmethod __fspath__()¶

Return the file system path representation of the object.

The method should only return a str or bytes object, with the preference being for str.

os.getenv(key, default=None)¶

Return the value of the environment variable key as a string if it exists, or default if it doesn’t. key is a string. Note that since getenv() uses os.environ, the mapping of getenv() is similarly also captured on import, and the function may not reflect future environment changes.

On Unix, keys and values are decoded with sys.getfilesystemencoding() and 'surrogateescape' error handler. Use os.getenvb() if you would like to use a different encoding.

Availability: Unix, Windows.

os.getenvb(key, default=None)¶

Return the value of the environment variable key as bytes if it exists, or default if it doesn’t. key must be bytes. Note that since getenvb() uses os.environb, the mapping of getenvb() is similarly also captured on import, and the function may not reflect future environment changes.

getenvb() is only available if supports_bytes_environ is True.

Availability: Unix.

Added in version 3.2.

os.get_exec_path(env=None)¶: Returns the list of directories that will be searched for a named executable, similar to a shell, when launching a process. env, when specified, should be an environment variable dictionary to lookup the PATH in. By default, when env is None, environ is used.

Added in version 3.2.

os.getegid()¶: Return the effective group id of the current process. This corresponds to the “set id” bit on the file being executed in the current process.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.geteuid()¶: Return the current process’s effective user id.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.getgid()¶: Return the real group id of the current process.

Availability: Unix.

The function is a stub on WASI, see WebAssembly platforms for more information.

os.getgrouplist(user, group, /)¶: Return list of group ids that user belongs to. If group is not in the list, it is included; typically, group is specified as the group ID field from the password record for user, because that group ID will otherwise be potentially omitted.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

Added in version 3.3.

os.getgroups()¶: Return list of supplemental group ids associated with the current process.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

Note

On macOS, getgroups() behavior differs somewhat from other Unix platforms. If the Python interpreter was built with a deployment target of 10.5 or earlier, getgroups() returns the list of effective group ids associated with the current user process; this list is limited to a system-defined number of entries, typically 16, and may be modified by calls to setgroups() if suitably privileged. If built with a deployment target greater than 10.5, getgroups() returns the current group access list for the user associated with the effective user id of the process; the group access list may change over the lifetime of the process, it is not affected by calls to setgroups(), and its length is not limited to 16. The deployment target value, MACOSX_DEPLOYMENT_TARGET, can be obtained with sysconfig.get_config_var().

os.getlogin()¶: Return the name of the user logged in on the controlling terminal of the process. For most purposes, it is more useful to use getpass.getuser() since the latter checks the environment variables LOGNAME or USERNAME to find out who the user is, and falls back to pwd.getpwuid(os.getuid())[0] to get the login name of the current real user id.

Availability: Unix, Windows, not WASI.

os.getpgid(pid)¶: Return the process group id of the process with process id pid. If pid is 0, the process group id of the current process is returned.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.getpgrp()¶: Return the id of the current process group.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.getpid()¶

Return the current process id.

The function is a stub on WASI, see WebAssembly platforms for more information.

os.getppid()¶: Return the parent’s process id. When the parent process has exited, on Unix the id returned is the one of the init process (1), on Windows it is still the same id, which may be already reused by another process.

Availability: Unix, Windows, not WASI.

Changed in version 3.2: Added support for Windows.

os.getpriority(which, who)¶: Get program scheduling priority. The value which is one of PRIO_PROCESS, PRIO_PGRP, or PRIO_USER, and who is interpreted relative to which (a process identifier for PRIO_PROCESS, process group identifier for PRIO_PGRP, and a user ID for PRIO_USER). A zero value for who denotes (respectively) the calling process, the process group of the calling process, or the real user ID of the calling process.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

Added in version 3.3.

os.PRIO_PROCESS¶
os.PRIO_PGRP¶
os.PRIO_USER¶: Parameters for the getpriority() and setpriority() functions.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

Added in version 3.3.

os.PRIO_DARWIN_THREAD¶
os.PRIO_DARWIN_PROCESS¶
os.PRIO_DARWIN_BG¶
os.PRIO_DARWIN_NONUI¶: Parameters for the getpriority() and setpriority() functions.

Availability: macOS

Added in version 3.12.

os.getresuid()¶: Return a tuple (ruid, euid, suid) denoting the current process’s real, effective, and saved user ids.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

Added in version 3.2.

os.getresgid()¶: Return a tuple (rgid, egid, sgid) denoting the current process’s real, effective, and saved group ids.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

Added in version 3.2.

os.getuid()¶: Return the current process’s real user id.

Availability: Unix.

The function is a stub on WASI, see WebAssembly platforms for more information.

os.initgroups(username, gid, /)¶: Call the system initgroups() to initialize the group access list with all of the groups of which the specified username is a member, plus the specified group id.

Availability: Unix, not WASI, not Android.

Added in version 3.2.

os.putenv(key, value, /)¶

Set the environment variable named key to the string value. Such changes to the environment affect subprocesses started with os.system(), popen() or fork() and execv().

Assignments to items in os.environ are automatically translated into corresponding calls to putenv(); however, calls to putenv() don’t update os.environ, so it is actually preferable to assign to items of os.environ. This also applies to getenv() and getenvb(), which respectively use os.environ and os.environb in their implementations.

Note

On some platforms, including FreeBSD and macOS, setting environ may cause memory leaks. Refer to the system documentation for putenv().

Raises an auditing event os.putenv with arguments key, value.

Changed in version 3.9: The function is now always available.

os.setegid(egid, /)¶: Set the current process’s effective group id.

Availability: Unix, not WASI, not Android.

os.seteuid(euid, /)¶: Set the current process’s effective user id.

Availability: Unix, not WASI, not Android.

os.setgid(gid, /)¶: Set the current process’ group id.

Availability: Unix, not WASI, not Android.

os.setgroups(groups, /)¶: Set the list of supplemental group ids associated with the current process to groups. groups must be a sequence, and each element must be an integer identifying a group. This operation is typically available only to the superuser.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

Note

On macOS, the length of groups may not exceed the system-defined maximum number of effective group ids, typically 16. See the documentation for getgroups() for cases where it may not return the same group list set by calling setgroups().

os.setns(fd, nstype=0)¶

Reassociate the current thread with a Linux namespace. See the setns(2) and namespaces(7) man pages for more details.

If fd refers to a /proc/pid/ns/ link, setns() reassociates the calling thread with the namespace associated with that link, and nstype may be set to one of the CLONE_NEW* constants to impose constraints on the operation (0 means no constraints).

Since Linux 5.8, fd may refer to a PID file descriptor obtained from pidfd_open(). In this case, setns() reassociates the calling thread into one or more of the same namespaces as the thread referred to by fd. This is subject to any constraints imposed by nstype, which is a bit mask combining one or more of the CLONE_NEW* constants, e.g. setns(fd, os.CLONE_NEWUTS | os.CLONE_NEWPID). The caller’s memberships in unspecified namespaces are left unchanged.

fd can be any object with a fileno() method, or a raw file descriptor.

This example reassociates the thread with the init process’s network namespace:

fd = os.open("/proc/1/ns/net", os.O_RDONLY)
os.setns(fd, os.CLONE_NEWNET)
os.close(fd)

Availability: Linux >= 3.0 with glibc >= 2.14.

Added in version 3.12.

See also

The unshare() function.

os.setpgrp()¶: Call the system call setpgrp() or setpgrp(0, 0) depending on which version is implemented (if any). See the Unix manual for the semantics.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.setpgid(pid, pgrp, /)¶: Call the system call setpgid() to set the process group id of the process with id pid to the process group with id pgrp. See the Unix manual for the semantics.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.setpriority(which, who, priority)¶: Set program scheduling priority. The value which is one of PRIO_PROCESS, PRIO_PGRP, or PRIO_USER, and who is interpreted relative to which (a process identifier for PRIO_PROCESS, process group identifier for PRIO_PGRP, and a user ID for PRIO_USER). A zero value for who denotes (respectively) the calling process, the process group of the calling process, or the real user ID of the calling process. priority is a value in the range -20 to 19. The default priority is 0; lower priorities cause more favorable scheduling.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

Added in version 3.3.

os.setregid(rgid, egid, /)¶: Set the current process’s real and effective group ids.

Availability: Unix, not WASI, not Android.

os.setresgid(rgid, egid, sgid, /)¶: Set the current process’s real, effective, and saved group ids.

Availability: Unix, not WASI, not Android.

Added in version 3.2.

os.setresuid(ruid, euid, suid, /)¶: Set the current process’s real, effective, and saved user ids.

Availability: Unix, not WASI, not Android.

Added in version 3.2.

os.setreuid(ruid, euid, /)¶: Set the current process’s real and effective user ids.

Availability: Unix, not WASI, not Android.

os.getsid(pid, /)¶: Call the system call getsid(). See the Unix manual for the semantics.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.setsid()¶: Call the system call setsid(). See the Unix manual for the semantics.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.setuid(uid, /)¶: Set the current process’s user id.

Availability: Unix, not WASI, not Android.

os.strerror(code, /)¶: Return the error message corresponding to the error code in code. On platforms where strerror() returns NULL when given an unknown error number, ValueError is raised.

os.supports_bytes_environ¶: True if the native OS type of the environment is bytes (eg. False on Windows).

Added in version 3.2.

os.umask(mask, /)¶

Set the current numeric umask and return the previous umask.

The function is a stub on WASI, see WebAssembly platforms for more information.

os.uname()¶

Returns information identifying the current operating system. The return value is an object with five attributes:

sysname - operating system name
nodename - name of machine on network (implementation-defined)
release - operating system release
version - operating system version
machine - hardware identifier

For backwards compatibility, this object is also iterable, behaving like a five-tuple containing sysname, nodename, release, version, and machine in that order.

Some systems truncate nodename to 8 characters or to the leading component; a better way to get the hostname is socket.gethostname() or even socket.gethostbyaddr(socket.gethostname()).

On macOS, iOS and Android, this returns the kernel name and version (i.e., 'Darwin' on macOS and iOS; 'Linux' on Android). platform.uname() can be used to get the user-facing operating system name and version on iOS and Android.

Availability: Unix.

Changed in version 3.3: Return type changed from a tuple to a tuple-like object with named attributes.

os.unsetenv(key, /)¶

Unset (delete) the environment variable named key. Such changes to the environment affect subprocesses started with os.system(), popen() or fork() and execv().

Deletion of items in os.environ is automatically translated into a corresponding call to unsetenv(); however, calls to unsetenv() don’t update os.environ, so it is actually preferable to delete items of os.environ.

Raises an auditing event os.unsetenv with argument key.

Changed in version 3.9: The function is now always available and is also available on Windows.

os.unshare(flags)¶: Disassociate parts of the process execution context, and move them into a newly created namespace. See the unshare(2) man page for more details. The flags argument is a bit mask, combining zero or more of the CLONE_* constants, that specifies which parts of the execution context should be unshared from their existing associations and moved to a new namespace. If the flags argument is 0, no changes are made to the calling process’s execution context.

Availability: Linux >= 2.6.16.

Added in version 3.12.

See also

The setns() function.

Flags to the unshare() function, if the implementation supports them. See unshare(2) in the Linux manual for their exact effect and availability.

os.CLONE_FILES¶
os.CLONE_FS¶
os.CLONE_NEWCGROUP¶
os.CLONE_NEWIPC¶
os.CLONE_NEWNET¶
os.CLONE_NEWNS¶
os.CLONE_NEWPID¶
os.CLONE_NEWTIME¶
os.CLONE_NEWUSER¶
os.CLONE_NEWUTS¶
os.CLONE_SIGHAND¶
os.CLONE_SYSVSEM¶
os.CLONE_THREAD¶
os.CLONE_VM¶

File Object Creation¶

These functions create new file objects. (See also open() for opening file descriptors.)

os.fdopen(fd, *args, **kwargs)¶: Return an open file object connected to the file descriptor fd. This is an alias of the open() built-in function and accepts the same arguments. The only difference is that the first argument of fdopen() must always be an integer.

File Descriptor Operations¶

These functions operate on I/O streams referenced using file descriptors.

File descriptors are small integers corresponding to a file that has been opened by the current process. For example, standard input is usually file descriptor 0, standard output is 1, and standard error is 2. Further files opened by a process will then be assigned 3, 4, 5, and so forth. The name “file descriptor” is slightly deceptive; on Unix platforms, sockets and pipes are also referenced by file descriptors.

The fileno() method can be used to obtain the file descriptor associated with a file object when required. Note that using the file descriptor directly will bypass the file object methods, ignoring aspects such as internal buffering of data.

os.close(fd)¶: Close file descriptor fd.

Note

This function is intended for low-level I/O and must be applied to a file descriptor as returned by os.open() or pipe(). To close a “file object” returned by the built-in function open() or by popen() or fdopen(), use its close() method.

os.closerange(fd_low, fd_high, /)¶

Close all file descriptors from fd_low (inclusive) to fd_high (exclusive), ignoring errors. Equivalent to (but much faster than):

for fd in range(fd_low, fd_high):
    try:
        os.close(fd)
    except OSError:
        pass

os.copy_file_range(src, dst, count, offset_src=None, offset_dst=None)¶

Copy count bytes from file descriptor src, starting from offset offset_src, to file descriptor dst, starting from offset offset_dst. If offset_src is None, then src is read from the current position; respectively for offset_dst.

In Linux kernel older than 5.3, the files pointed to by src and dst must reside in the same filesystem, otherwise an OSError is raised with errno set to errno.EXDEV.

This copy is done without the additional cost of transferring data from the kernel to user space and then back into the kernel. Additionally, some filesystems could implement extra optimizations, such as the use of reflinks (i.e., two or more inodes that share pointers to the same copy-on-write disk blocks; supported file systems include btrfs and XFS) and server-side copy (in the case of NFS).

The function copies bytes between two file descriptors. Text options, like the encoding and the line ending, are ignored.

The return value is the amount of bytes copied. This could be less than the amount requested.

Note

On Linux, os.copy_file_range() should not be used for copying a range of a pseudo file from a special filesystem like procfs and sysfs. It will always copy no bytes and return 0 as if the file was empty because of a known Linux kernel issue.

Availability: Linux >= 4.5 with glibc >= 2.27.

Added in version 3.8.

os.device_encoding(fd)¶

Return a string describing the encoding of the device associated with fd if it is connected to a terminal; else return None.

On Unix, if the Python UTF-8 Mode is enabled, return 'UTF-8' rather than the device encoding.

Changed in version 3.10: On Unix, the function now implements the Python UTF-8 Mode.

os.dup(fd, /)¶

Return a duplicate of file descriptor fd. The new file descriptor is non-inheritable.

On Windows, when duplicating a standard stream (0: stdin, 1: stdout, 2: stderr), the new file descriptor is inheritable.

Availability: not WASI.

Changed in version 3.4: The new file descriptor is now non-inheritable.

os.dup2(fd, fd2, inheritable=True)¶: Duplicate file descriptor fd to fd2, closing the latter first if necessary. Return fd2. The new file descriptor is inheritable by default or non-inheritable if inheritable is False.

Availability: not WASI.

Changed in version 3.4: Add the optional inheritable parameter.

Changed in version 3.7: Return fd2 on success. Previously, None was always returned.

os.fchmod(fd, mode)¶

Change the mode of the file given by fd to the numeric mode. See the docs for chmod() for possible values of mode. As of Python 3.3, this is equivalent to os.chmod(fd, mode).

Raises an auditing event os.chmod with arguments path, mode, dir_fd.

Availability: Unix, Windows.

The function is limited on WASI, see WebAssembly platforms for more information.

Changed in version 3.13: Added support on Windows.

os.fchown(fd, uid, gid)¶

Change the owner and group id of the file given by fd to the numeric uid and gid. To leave one of the ids unchanged, set it to -1. See chown(). As of Python 3.3, this is equivalent to os.chown(fd, uid, gid).

Raises an auditing event os.chown with arguments path, uid, gid, dir_fd.

Availability: Unix.

The function is limited on WASI, see WebAssembly platforms for more information.

os.fdatasync(fd)¶: Force write of file with filedescriptor fd to disk. Does not force update of metadata.

Availability: Unix.

Note

This function is not available on MacOS.

os.fpathconf(fd, name, /)¶

Return system configuration information relevant to an open file. name specifies the configuration value to retrieve; it may be a string which is the name of a defined system value; these names are specified in a number of standards (POSIX.1, Unix 95, Unix 98, and others). Some platforms define additional names as well. The names known to the host operating system are given in the pathconf_names dictionary. For configuration variables not included in that mapping, passing an integer for name is also accepted.

If name is a string and is not known, ValueError is raised. If a specific value for name is not supported by the host system, even if it is included in pathconf_names, an OSError is raised with errno.EINVAL for the error number.

As of Python 3.3, this is equivalent to os.pathconf(fd, name).

Availability: Unix.

os.fstat(fd)¶

Get the status of the file descriptor fd. Return a stat_result object.

As of Python 3.3, this is equivalent to os.stat(fd).

See also

The stat() function.

os.fstatvfs(fd, /)¶: Return information about the filesystem containing the file associated with file descriptor fd, like statvfs(). As of Python 3.3, this is equivalent to os.statvfs(fd).

Availability: Unix.

os.fsync(fd)¶

Force write of file with filedescriptor fd to disk. On Unix, this calls the native fsync() function; on Windows, the MS _commit() function.

If you’re starting with a buffered Python file object f, first do f.flush(), and then do os.fsync(f.fileno()), to ensure that all internal buffers associated with f are written to disk.

Availability: Unix, Windows.

os.ftruncate(fd, length, /)¶

Truncate the file corresponding to file descriptor fd, so that it is at most length bytes in size. As of Python 3.3, this is equivalent to os.truncate(fd, length).

Raises an auditing event os.truncate with arguments fd, length.

Availability: Unix, Windows.

Changed in version 3.5: Added support for Windows

os.get_blocking(fd, /)¶

Get the blocking mode of the file descriptor: False if the O_NONBLOCK flag is set, True if the flag is cleared.

Availability: Unix, Windows.

The function is limited on WASI, see WebAssembly platforms for more information.

On Windows, this function is limited to pipes.

Added in version 3.5.

Changed in version 3.12: Added support for pipes on Windows.

os.grantpt(fd, /)¶

Grant access to the slave pseudo-terminal device associated with the master pseudo-terminal device to which the file descriptor fd refers. The file descriptor fd is not closed upon failure.

Calls the C standard library function grantpt().

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

Added in version 3.13.

os.isatty(fd, /)¶: Return True if the file descriptor fd is open and connected to a tty(-like) device, else False.

os.lockf(fd, cmd, len, /)¶

Apply, test or remove a POSIX lock on an open file descriptor. fd is an open file descriptor. cmd specifies the command to use - one of F_LOCK, F_TLOCK, F_ULOCK or F_TEST. len specifies the section of the file to lock.

Raises an auditing event os.lockf with arguments fd, cmd, len.

Availability: Unix.

Added in version 3.3.

os.F_LOCK¶
os.F_TLOCK¶
os.F_ULOCK¶
os.F_TEST¶: Flags that specify what action lockf() will take.

Availability: Unix.

Added in version 3.3.

os.login_tty(fd, /)¶: Prepare the tty of which fd is a file descriptor for a new login session. Make the calling process a session leader; make the tty the controlling tty, the stdin, the stdout, and the stderr of the calling process; close fd.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

Added in version 3.11.

os.lseek(fd, pos, whence, /)¶

Set the current position of file descriptor fd to position pos, modified by whence, and return the new position in bytes relative to the start of the file. Valid values for whence are:

SEEK_SET or 0 – set pos relative to the beginning of the file
SEEK_CUR or 1 – set pos relative to the current file position
SEEK_END or 2 – set pos relative to the end of the file
SEEK_HOLE – set pos to the next data location, relative to pos
SEEK_DATA – set pos to the next data hole, relative to pos

Changed in version 3.3: Add support for SEEK_HOLE and SEEK_DATA.

os.SEEK_SET¶

os.SEEK_CUR¶

os.SEEK_END¶

Parameters to the lseek() function and the seek() method on file-like objects, for whence to adjust the file position indicator.

SEEK_SET: Adjust the file position relative to the beginning of the file.
SEEK_CUR: Adjust the file position relative to the current file position.
SEEK_END: Adjust the file position relative to the end of the file.

Their values are 0, 1, and 2, respectively.

os.SEEK_HOLE¶

os.SEEK_DATA¶

Parameters to the lseek() function and the seek() method on file-like objects, for seeking file data and holes on sparsely allocated files.

SEEK_DATA: Adjust the file offset to the next location containing data, relative to the seek position.
SEEK_HOLE: Adjust the file offset to the next location containing a hole, relative to the seek position. A hole is defined as a sequence of zeros.

Note

These operations only make sense for filesystems that support them.

Availability: Linux >= 3.1, macOS, Unix

Added in version 3.3.

os.open(path, flags, mode=0o777, *, dir_fd=None)¶

Open the file path and set various flags according to flags and possibly its mode according to mode. When computing mode, the current umask value is first masked out. Return the file descriptor for the newly opened file. The new file descriptor is non-inheritable.

For a description of the flag and mode values, see the C run-time documentation; flag constants (like O_RDONLY and O_WRONLY) are defined in the os module. In particular, on Windows adding O_BINARY is needed to open files in binary mode.

This function can support paths relative to directory descriptors with the dir_fd parameter.

Raises an auditing event open with arguments path, mode, flags.

Changed in version 3.4: The new file descriptor is now non-inheritable.

Note

This function is intended for low-level I/O. For normal usage, use the built-in function open(), which returns a file object with read() and write() methods (and many more). To wrap a file descriptor in a file object, use fdopen().

Changed in version 3.3: Added the dir_fd parameter.

Changed in version 3.5: If the system call is interrupted and the signal handler does not raise an exception, the function now retries the system call instead of raising an InterruptedError exception (see PEP 475 for the rationale).

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

The following constants are options for the flags parameter to the open() function. They can be combined using the bitwise OR operator |. Some of them are not available on all platforms. For descriptions of their availability and use, consult the open(2) manual page on Unix or the MSDN on Windows.

os.O_RDONLY¶
os.O_WRONLY¶
os.O_RDWR¶
os.O_APPEND¶
os.O_CREAT¶
os.O_EXCL¶
os.O_TRUNC¶: The above constants are available on Unix and Windows.

os.O_DSYNC¶
os.O_RSYNC¶
os.O_SYNC¶
os.O_NDELAY¶
os.O_NONBLOCK¶
os.O_NOCTTY¶
os.O_CLOEXEC¶: The above constants are only available on Unix.

Changed in version 3.3: Add O_CLOEXEC constant.

os.O_BINARY¶
os.O_NOINHERIT¶
os.O_SHORT_LIVED¶
os.O_TEMPORARY¶
os.O_RANDOM¶
os.O_SEQUENTIAL¶
os.O_TEXT¶: The above constants are only available on Windows.

os.O_EVTONLY¶
os.O_FSYNC¶
os.O_SYMLINK¶
os.O_NOFOLLOW_ANY¶: The above constants are only available on macOS.

Changed in version 3.10: Add O_EVTONLY, O_FSYNC, O_SYMLINK and O_NOFOLLOW_ANY constants.

os.O_ASYNC¶
os.O_DIRECT¶
os.O_DIRECTORY¶
os.O_NOFOLLOW¶
os.O_NOATIME¶
os.O_PATH¶
os.O_TMPFILE¶
os.O_SHLOCK¶
os.O_EXLOCK¶: The above constants are extensions and not present if they are not defined by the C library.

Changed in version 3.4: Add O_PATH on systems that support it. Add O_TMPFILE, only available on Linux Kernel 3.11 or newer.

os.openpty()¶: Open a new pseudo-terminal pair. Return a pair of file descriptors (master, slave) for the pty and the tty, respectively. The new file descriptors are non-inheritable. For a (slightly) more portable approach, use the pty module.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

Changed in version 3.4: The new file descriptors are now non-inheritable.

os.pipe()¶: Create a pipe. Return a pair of file descriptors (r, w) usable for reading and writing, respectively. The new file descriptor is non-inheritable.

Availability: Unix, Windows.

Changed in version 3.4: The new file descriptors are now non-inheritable.

os.pipe2(flags, /)¶: Create a pipe with flags set atomically. flags can be constructed by ORing together one or more of these values: O_NONBLOCK, O_CLOEXEC. Return a pair of file descriptors (r, w) usable for reading and writing, respectively.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

Added in version 3.3.

os.posix_fallocate(fd, offset, len, /)¶: Ensures that enough disk space is allocated for the file specified by fd starting from offset and continuing for len bytes.

Availability: Unix.

Added in version 3.3.

os.posix_fadvise(fd, offset, len, advice, /)¶: Announces an intention to access data in a specific pattern thus allowing the kernel to make optimizations. The advice applies to the region of the file specified by fd starting at offset and continuing for len bytes. advice is one of POSIX_FADV_NORMAL, POSIX_FADV_SEQUENTIAL, POSIX_FADV_RANDOM, POSIX_FADV_NOREUSE, POSIX_FADV_WILLNEED or POSIX_FADV_DONTNEED.

Availability: Unix.

Added in version 3.3.

os.POSIX_FADV_NORMAL¶
os.POSIX_FADV_SEQUENTIAL¶
os.POSIX_FADV_RANDOM¶
os.POSIX_FADV_NOREUSE¶
os.POSIX_FADV_WILLNEED¶
os.POSIX_FADV_DONTNEED¶: Flags that can be used in advice in posix_fadvise() that specify the access pattern that is likely to be used.

Availability: Unix.

Added in version 3.3.

os.pread(fd, n, offset, /)¶

Read at most n bytes from file descriptor fd at a position of offset, leaving the file offset unchanged.

Return a bytestring containing the bytes read. If the end of the file referred to by fd has been reached, an empty bytes object is returned.

Availability: Unix.

Added in version 3.3.

os.posix_openpt(oflag, /)¶

Open and return a file descriptor for a master pseudo-terminal device.

Calls the C standard library function posix_openpt(). The oflag argument is used to set file status flags and file access modes as specified in the manual page of posix_openpt() of your system.

The returned file descriptor is non-inheritable. If the value O_CLOEXEC is available on the system, it is added to oflag.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

Added in version 3.13.

os.preadv(fd, buffers, offset, flags=0, /)¶

Read from a file descriptor fd at a position of offset into mutable bytes-like objects buffers, leaving the file offset unchanged. Transfer data into each buffer until it is full and then move on to the next buffer in the sequence to hold the rest of the data.

The flags argument contains a bitwise OR of zero or more of the following flags:

Return the total number of bytes actually read which can be less than the total capacity of all the objects.

The operating system may set a limit (sysconf() value 'SC_IOV_MAX') on the number of buffers that can be used.

Combine the functionality of os.readv() and os.pread().

Availability: Linux >= 2.6.30, FreeBSD >= 6.0, OpenBSD >= 2.7, AIX >= 7.1.

Using flags requires Linux >= 4.6.

Added in version 3.7.

os.RWF_NOWAIT¶

Do not wait for data which is not immediately available. If this flag is specified, the system call will return instantly if it would have to read data from the backing storage or wait for a lock.

If some data was successfully read, it will return the number of bytes read. If no bytes were read, it will return -1 and set errno to errno.EAGAIN.

Availability: Linux >= 4.14.

Added in version 3.7.

os.RWF_HIPRI¶

High priority read/write. Allows block-based filesystems to use polling of the device, which provides lower latency, but may use additional resources.

Currently, on Linux, this feature is usable only on a file descriptor opened using the O_DIRECT flag.

Availability: Linux >= 4.6.

Added in version 3.7.

os.ptsname(fd, /)¶

Return the name of the slave pseudo-terminal device associated with the master pseudo-terminal device to which the file descriptor fd refers. The file descriptor fd is not closed upon failure.

Calls the reentrant C standard library function ptsname_r() if it is available; otherwise, the C standard library function ptsname(), which is not guaranteed to be thread-safe, is called.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

Added in version 3.13.

os.pwrite(fd, str, offset, /)¶

Write the bytestring in str to file descriptor fd at position of offset, leaving the file offset unchanged.

Return the number of bytes actually written.

Availability: Unix.

Added in version 3.3.

os.pwritev(fd, buffers, offset, flags=0, /)¶

Write the buffers contents to file descriptor fd at an offset offset, leaving the file offset unchanged. buffers must be a sequence of bytes-like objects. Buffers are processed in array order. Entire contents of the first buffer is written before proceeding to the second, and so on.

The flags argument contains a bitwise OR of zero or more of the following flags:

Return the total number of bytes actually written.

The operating system may set a limit (sysconf() value 'SC_IOV_MAX') on the number of buffers that can be used.

Combine the functionality of os.writev() and os.pwrite().

Availability: Linux >= 2.6.30, FreeBSD >= 6.0, OpenBSD >= 2.7, AIX >= 7.1.

Using flags requires Linux >= 4.6.

Added in version 3.7.

os.RWF_DSYNC¶: Provide a per-write equivalent of the O_DSYNC os.open() flag. This flag effect applies only to the data range written by the system call.

Availability: Linux >= 4.7.

Added in version 3.7.

os.RWF_SYNC¶: Provide a per-write equivalent of the O_SYNC os.open() flag. This flag effect applies only to the data range written by the system call.

Availability: Linux >= 4.7.

Added in version 3.7.

os.RWF_APPEND¶: Provide a per-write equivalent of the O_APPEND os.open() flag. This flag is meaningful only for os.pwritev(), and its effect applies only to the data range written by the system call. The offset argument does not affect the write operation; the data is always appended to the end of the file. However, if the offset argument is -1, the current file offset is updated.

Availability: Linux >= 4.16.

Added in version 3.10.

os.read(fd, n, /)¶

Read at most n bytes from file descriptor fd.

Return a bytestring containing the bytes read. If the end of the file referred to by fd has been reached, an empty bytes object is returned.

Note

This function is intended for low-level I/O and must be applied to a file descriptor as returned by os.open() or pipe(). To read a “file object” returned by the built-in function open() or by popen() or fdopen(), or sys.stdin, use its read() or readline() methods.

os.sendfile(out_fd, in_fd, offset, count)¶

os.sendfile(out_fd, in_fd, offset, count, headers=(), trailers=(), flags=0)

Copy count bytes from file descriptor in_fd to file descriptor out_fd starting at offset. Return the number of bytes sent. When EOF is reached return 0.

The first function notation is supported by all platforms that define sendfile().

On Linux, if offset is given as None, the bytes are read from the current position of in_fd and the position of in_fd is updated.

The second case may be used on macOS and FreeBSD where headers and trailers are arbitrary sequences of buffers that are written before and after the data from in_fd is written. It returns the same as the first case.

On macOS and FreeBSD, a value of 0 for count specifies to send until the end of in_fd is reached.

All platforms support sockets as out_fd file descriptor, and some platforms allow other types (e.g. regular file, pipe) as well.

Cross-platform applications should not use headers, trailers and flags arguments.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

Note

For a higher-level wrapper of sendfile(), see socket.socket.sendfile().

Added in version 3.3.

Changed in version 3.9: Parameters out and in was renamed to out_fd and in_fd.

os.SF_NODISKIO¶
os.SF_MNOWAIT¶
os.SF_SYNC¶: Parameters to the sendfile() function, if the implementation supports them.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

Added in version 3.3.

os.SF_NOCACHE¶: Parameter to the sendfile() function, if the implementation supports it. The data won’t be cached in the virtual memory and will be freed afterwards.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

Added in version 3.11.

os.set_blocking(fd, blocking, /)¶

Set the blocking mode of the specified file descriptor. Set the O_NONBLOCK flag if blocking is False, clear the flag otherwise.

Availability: Unix, Windows.

The function is limited on WASI, see WebAssembly platforms for more information.

On Windows, this function is limited to pipes.

Added in version 3.5.

Changed in version 3.12: Added support for pipes on Windows.

os.splice(src, dst, count, offset_src=None, offset_dst=None)¶

Transfer count bytes from file descriptor src, starting from offset offset_src, to file descriptor dst, starting from offset offset_dst. At least one of the file descriptors must refer to a pipe. If offset_src is None, then src is read from the current position; respectively for offset_dst. The offset associated to the file descriptor that refers to a pipe must be None. The files pointed to by src and dst must reside in the same filesystem, otherwise an OSError is raised with errno set to errno.EXDEV.

Upon successful completion, returns the number of bytes spliced to or from the pipe. A return value of 0 means end of input. If src refers to a pipe, then this means that there was no data to transfer, and it would not make sense to block because there are no writers connected to the write end of the pipe.

Availability: Linux >= 2.6.17 with glibc >= 2.5

Added in version 3.10.

os.SPLICE_F_MOVE¶
os.SPLICE_F_NONBLOCK¶
os.SPLICE_F_MORE¶: Added in version 3.10.

os.readv(fd, buffers, /)¶

Read from a file descriptor fd into a number of mutable bytes-like objects buffers. Transfer data into each buffer until it is full and then move on to the next buffer in the sequence to hold the rest of the data.

Return the total number of bytes actually read which can be less than the total capacity of all the objects.

The operating system may set a limit (sysconf() value 'SC_IOV_MAX') on the number of buffers that can be used.

Availability: Unix.

Added in version 3.3.

os.tcgetpgrp(fd, /)¶: Return the process group associated with the terminal given by fd (an open file descriptor as returned by os.open()).

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.tcsetpgrp(fd, pg, /)¶: Set the process group associated with the terminal given by fd (an open file descriptor as returned by os.open()) to pg.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.ttyname(fd, /)¶: Return a string which specifies the terminal device associated with file descriptor fd. If fd is not associated with a terminal device, an exception is raised.

Availability: Unix.

os.unlockpt(fd, /)¶

Unlock the slave pseudo-terminal device associated with the master pseudo-terminal device to which the file descriptor fd refers. The file descriptor fd is not closed upon failure.

Calls the C standard library function unlockpt().

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

Added in version 3.13.

os.write(fd, str, /)¶

Write the bytestring in str to file descriptor fd.

Return the number of bytes actually written.

Note

This function is intended for low-level I/O and must be applied to a file descriptor as returned by os.open() or pipe(). To write a “file object” returned by the built-in function open() or by popen() or fdopen(), or sys.stdout or sys.stderr, use its write() method.

os.writev(fd, buffers, /)¶

Write the contents of buffers to file descriptor fd. buffers must be a sequence of bytes-like objects. Buffers are processed in array order. Entire contents of the first buffer is written before proceeding to the second, and so on.

Returns the total number of bytes actually written.

The operating system may set a limit (sysconf() value 'SC_IOV_MAX') on the number of buffers that can be used.

Availability: Unix.

Added in version 3.3.

Querying the size of a terminal¶

Added in version 3.3.

os.get_terminal_size(fd=STDOUT_FILENO, /)¶

Return the size of the terminal window as (columns, lines), tuple of type terminal_size.

The optional argument fd (default STDOUT_FILENO, or standard output) specifies which file descriptor should be queried.

If the file descriptor is not connected to a terminal, an OSError is raised.

shutil.get_terminal_size() is the high-level function which should normally be used, os.get_terminal_size is the low-level implementation.

Availability: Unix, Windows.

class os.terminal_size¶

A subclass of tuple, holding (columns, lines) of the terminal window size.

columns¶: Width of the terminal window in characters.

lines¶: Height of the terminal window in characters.

Inheritance of File Descriptors¶

Added in version 3.4.

A file descriptor has an “inheritable” flag which indicates if the file descriptor can be inherited by child processes. Since Python 3.4, file descriptors created by Python are non-inheritable by default.

On UNIX, non-inheritable file descriptors are closed in child processes at the execution of a new program, other file descriptors are inherited.

On Windows, non-inheritable handles and file descriptors are closed in child processes, except for standard streams (file descriptors 0, 1 and 2: stdin, stdout and stderr), which are always inherited. Using spawn* functions, all inheritable handles and all inheritable file descriptors are inherited. Using the subprocess module, all file descriptors except standard streams are closed, and inheritable handles are only inherited if the close_fds parameter is False.

On WebAssembly platforms, the file descriptor cannot be modified.

os.get_inheritable(fd, /)¶: Get the “inheritable” flag of the specified file descriptor (a boolean).

os.set_inheritable(fd, inheritable, /)¶: Set the “inheritable” flag of the specified file descriptor.

os.get_handle_inheritable(handle, /)¶: Get the “inheritable” flag of the specified handle (a boolean).

Availability: Windows.

os.set_handle_inheritable(handle, inheritable, /)¶: Set the “inheritable” flag of the specified handle.

Availability: Windows.

Files and Directories¶

On some Unix platforms, many of these functions support one or more of these features:

specifying a file descriptor: Normally the path argument provided to functions in the os module must be a string specifying a file path. However, some functions now alternatively accept an open file descriptor for their path argument. The function will then operate on the file referred to by the descriptor. (For POSIX systems, Python will call the variant of the function prefixed with f (e.g. call fchdir instead of chdir).)

You can check whether or not path can be specified as a file descriptor for a particular function on your platform using os.supports_fd. If this functionality is unavailable, using it will raise a NotImplementedError.

If the function also supports dir_fd or follow_symlinks arguments, it’s an error to specify one of those when supplying path as a file descriptor.

paths relative to directory descriptors: If dir_fd is not None, it should be a file descriptor referring to a directory, and the path to operate on should be relative; path will then be relative to that directory. If the path is absolute, dir_fd is ignored. (For POSIX systems, Python will call the variant of the function with an at suffix and possibly prefixed with f (e.g. call faccessat instead of access).

You can check whether or not dir_fd is supported for a particular function on your platform using os.supports_dir_fd. If it’s unavailable, using it will raise a NotImplementedError.

not following symlinks: If follow_symlinks is False, and the last element of the path to operate on is a symbolic link, the function will operate on the symbolic link itself rather than the file pointed to by the link. (For POSIX systems, Python will call the l... variant of the function.)

You can check whether or not follow_symlinks is supported for a particular function on your platform using os.supports_follow_symlinks. If it’s unavailable, using it will raise a NotImplementedError.

os.access(path, mode, *, dir_fd=None, effective_ids=False, follow_symlinks=True)¶

Use the real uid/gid to test for access to path. Note that most operations will use the effective uid/gid, therefore this routine can be used in a suid/sgid environment to test if the invoking user has the specified access to path. mode should be F_OK to test the existence of path, or it can be the inclusive OR of one or more of R_OK, W_OK, and X_OK to test permissions. Return True if access is allowed, False if not. See the Unix man page access(2) for more information.

This function can support specifying paths relative to directory descriptors and not following symlinks.

If effective_ids is True, access() will perform its access checks using the effective uid/gid instead of the real uid/gid. effective_ids may not be supported on your platform; you can check whether or not it is available using os.supports_effective_ids. If it is unavailable, using it will raise a NotImplementedError.

Note

Using access() to check if a user is authorized to e.g. open a file before actually doing so using open() creates a security hole, because the user might exploit the short time interval between checking and opening the file to manipulate it. It’s preferable to use EAFP techniques. For example:

if os.access("myfile", os.R_OK):
    with open("myfile") as fp:
        return fp.read()
return "some default data"

is better written as:

try:
    fp = open("myfile")
except PermissionError:
    return "some default data"
else:
    with fp:
        return fp.read()

Note

I/O operations may fail even when access() indicates that they would succeed, particularly for operations on network filesystems which may have permissions semantics beyond the usual POSIX permission-bit model.

Changed in version 3.3: Added the dir_fd, effective_ids, and follow_symlinks parameters.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

os.F_OK¶
os.R_OK¶
os.W_OK¶
os.X_OK¶: Values to pass as the mode parameter of access() to test the existence, readability, writability and executability of path, respectively.

os.chdir(path)¶

Change the current working directory to path.

This function can support specifying a file descriptor. The descriptor must refer to an opened directory, not an open file.

This function can raise OSError and subclasses such as FileNotFoundError, PermissionError, and NotADirectoryError.

Raises an auditing event os.chdir with argument path.

Changed in version 3.3: Added support for specifying path as a file descriptor on some platforms.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

os.chflags(path, flags, *, follow_symlinks=True)¶

Set the flags of path to the numeric flags. flags may take a combination (bitwise OR) of the following values (as defined in the stat module):

This function can support not following symlinks.

Raises an auditing event os.chflags with arguments path, flags.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

Changed in version 3.3: Added the follow_symlinks parameter.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

os.chmod(path, mode, *, dir_fd=None, follow_symlinks=True)¶

Change the mode of path to the numeric mode. mode may take one of the following values (as defined in the stat module) or bitwise ORed combinations of them:

This function can support specifying a file descriptor, paths relative to directory descriptors and not following symlinks.

Note

Although Windows supports chmod(), you can only set the file’s read-only flag with it (via the stat.S_IWRITE and stat.S_IREAD constants or a corresponding integer value). All other bits are ignored. The default value of follow_symlinks is False on Windows.

The function is limited on WASI, see WebAssembly platforms for more information.

Raises an auditing event os.chmod with arguments path, mode, dir_fd.

Changed in version 3.3: Added support for specifying path as an open file descriptor, and the dir_fd and follow_symlinks arguments.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

Changed in version 3.13: Added support for a file descriptor and the follow_symlinks argument on Windows.

os.chown(path, uid, gid, *, dir_fd=None, follow_symlinks=True)¶

Change the owner and group id of path to the numeric uid and gid. To leave one of the ids unchanged, set it to -1.

This function can support specifying a file descriptor, paths relative to directory descriptors and not following symlinks.

See shutil.chown() for a higher-level function that accepts names in addition to numeric ids.

Raises an auditing event os.chown with arguments path, uid, gid, dir_fd.

Availability: Unix.

The function is limited on WASI, see WebAssembly platforms for more information.

Changed in version 3.3: Added support for specifying path as an open file descriptor, and the dir_fd and follow_symlinks arguments.

Changed in version 3.6: Supports a path-like object.

os.chroot(path)¶: Change the root directory of the current process to path.

Availability: Unix, not WASI, not Android.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

os.fchdir(fd)¶

Change the current working directory to the directory represented by the file descriptor fd. The descriptor must refer to an opened directory, not an open file. As of Python 3.3, this is equivalent to os.chdir(fd).

Raises an auditing event os.chdir with argument path.

Availability: Unix.

os.getcwd()¶: Return a string representing the current working directory.

os.getcwdb()¶: Return a bytestring representing the current working directory.

Changed in version 3.8: The function now uses the UTF-8 encoding on Windows, rather than the ANSI code page: see PEP 529 for the rationale. The function is no longer deprecated on Windows.

os.lchflags(path, flags)¶

Set the flags of path to the numeric flags, like chflags(), but do not follow symbolic links. As of Python 3.3, this is equivalent to os.chflags(path, flags, follow_symlinks=False).

Raises an auditing event os.chflags with arguments path, flags.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

os.lchmod(path, mode)¶

Change the mode of path to the numeric mode. If path is a symlink, this affects the symlink rather than the target. See the docs for chmod() for possible values of mode. As of Python 3.3, this is equivalent to os.chmod(path, mode, follow_symlinks=False).

lchmod() is not part of POSIX, but Unix implementations may have it if changing the mode of symbolic links is supported.

Raises an auditing event os.chmod with arguments path, mode, dir_fd.

Availability: Unix, Windows, not Linux, FreeBSD >= 1.3, NetBSD >= 1.3, not OpenBSD

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

Changed in version 3.13: Added support on Windows.

os.lchown(path, uid, gid)¶

Change the owner and group id of path to the numeric uid and gid. This function will not follow symbolic links. As of Python 3.3, this is equivalent to os.chown(path, uid, gid, follow_symlinks=False).

Raises an auditing event os.chown with arguments path, uid, gid, dir_fd.

Availability: Unix.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

os.link(src, dst, *, src_dir_fd=None, dst_dir_fd=None, follow_symlinks=True)¶

Create a hard link pointing to src named dst.

This function can support specifying src_dir_fd and/or dst_dir_fd to supply paths relative to directory descriptors, and not following symlinks.

Raises an auditing event os.link with arguments src, dst, src_dir_fd, dst_dir_fd.

Availability: Unix, Windows.

Changed in version 3.2: Added Windows support.

Changed in version 3.3: Added the src_dir_fd, dst_dir_fd, and follow_symlinks parameters.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object for src and dst.

os.listdir(path='.')¶

Return a list containing the names of the entries in the directory given by path. The list is in arbitrary order, and does not include the special entries '.' and '..' even if they are present in the directory. If a file is removed from or added to the directory during the call of this function, whether a name for that file be included is unspecified.

path may be a path-like object. If path is of type bytes (directly or indirectly through the PathLike interface), the filenames returned will also be of type bytes; in all other circumstances, they will be of type str.

This function can also support specifying a file descriptor; the file descriptor must refer to a directory.

Raises an auditing event os.listdir with argument path.

Note

To encode str filenames to bytes, use fsencode().

See also

The scandir() function returns directory entries along with file attribute information, giving better performance for many common use cases.

Changed in version 3.2: The path parameter became optional.

Changed in version 3.3: Added support for specifying path as an open file descriptor.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

os.listdrives()¶

Return a list containing the names of drives on a Windows system.

A drive name typically looks like 'C:\\'. Not every drive name will be associated with a volume, and some may be inaccessible for a variety of reasons, including permissions, network connectivity or missing media. This function does not test for access.

May raise OSError if an error occurs collecting the drive names.

Raises an auditing event os.listdrives with no arguments.

Availability: Windows

Added in version 3.12.

os.listmounts(volume)¶

Return a list containing the mount points for a volume on a Windows system.

volume must be represented as a GUID path, like those returned by os.listvolumes(). Volumes may be mounted in multiple locations or not at all. In the latter case, the list will be empty. Mount points that are not associated with a volume will not be returned by this function.

The mount points return by this function will be absolute paths, and may be longer than the drive name.

Raises OSError if the volume is not recognized or if an error occurs collecting the paths.

Raises an auditing event os.listmounts with argument volume.

Availability: Windows

Added in version 3.12.

os.listvolumes()¶

Return a list containing the volumes in the system.

Volumes are typically represented as a GUID path that looks like \\?\Volume{xxxxxxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxxxxxxxxxx}\. Files can usually be accessed through a GUID path, permissions allowing. However, users are generally not familiar with them, and so the recommended use of this function is to retrieve mount points using os.listmounts().

May raise OSError if an error occurs collecting the volumes.

Raises an auditing event os.listvolumes with no arguments.

Availability: Windows

Added in version 3.12.

os.lstat(path, *, dir_fd=None)¶

Perform the equivalent of an lstat() system call on the given path. Similar to stat(), but does not follow symbolic links. Return a stat_result object.

On platforms that do not support symbolic links, this is an alias for stat().

As of Python 3.3, this is equivalent to os.stat(path, dir_fd=dir_fd, follow_symlinks=False).

This function can also support paths relative to directory descriptors.

See also

The stat() function.

Changed in version 3.2: Added support for Windows 6.0 (Vista) symbolic links.

Changed in version 3.3: Added the dir_fd parameter.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

Changed in version 3.8: On Windows, now opens reparse points that represent another path (name surrogates), including symbolic links and directory junctions. Other kinds of reparse points are resolved by the operating system as for stat().

os.mkdir(path, mode=0o777, *, dir_fd=None)¶

Create a directory named path with numeric mode mode.

If the directory already exists, FileExistsError is raised. If a parent directory in the path does not exist, FileNotFoundError is raised.

On some systems, mode is ignored. Where it is used, the current umask value is first masked out. If bits other than the last 9 (i.e. the last 3 digits of the octal representation of the mode) are set, their meaning is platform-dependent. On some platforms, they are ignored and you should call chmod() explicitly to set them.

On Windows, a mode of 0o700 is specifically handled to apply access control to the new directory such that only the current user and administrators have access. Other values of mode are ignored.

This function can also support paths relative to directory descriptors.

It is also possible to create temporary directories; see the tempfile module’s tempfile.mkdtemp() function.

Raises an auditing event os.mkdir with arguments path, mode, dir_fd.

Changed in version 3.3: Added the dir_fd parameter.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

Changed in version 3.13: Windows now handles a mode of 0o700.

os.makedirs(name, mode=0o777, exist_ok=False)¶

Recursive directory creation function. Like mkdir(), but makes all intermediate-level directories needed to contain the leaf directory.

The mode parameter is passed to mkdir() for creating the leaf directory; see the mkdir() description for how it is interpreted. To set the file permission bits of any newly created parent directories you can set the umask before invoking makedirs(). The file permission bits of existing parent directories are not changed.

If exist_ok is False (the default), a FileExistsError is raised if the target directory already exists.

Note

makedirs() will become confused if the path elements to create include pardir (eg. “..” on UNIX systems).

This function handles UNC paths correctly.

Raises an auditing event os.mkdir with arguments path, mode, dir_fd.

Changed in version 3.2: Added the exist_ok parameter.

Changed in version 3.4.1: Before Python 3.4.1, if exist_ok was True and the directory existed, makedirs() would still raise an error if mode did not match the mode of the existing directory. Since this behavior was impossible to implement safely, it was removed in Python 3.4.1. See bpo-21082.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

Changed in version 3.7: The mode argument no longer affects the file permission bits of newly created intermediate-level directories.

os.mkfifo(path, mode=0o666, *, dir_fd=None)¶

Create a FIFO (a named pipe) named path with numeric mode mode. The current umask value is first masked out from the mode.

This function can also support paths relative to directory descriptors.

FIFOs are pipes that can be accessed like regular files. FIFOs exist until they are deleted (for example with os.unlink()). Generally, FIFOs are used as rendezvous between “client” and “server” type processes: the server opens the FIFO for reading, and the client opens it for writing. Note that mkfifo() doesn’t open the FIFO — it just creates the rendezvous point.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

Changed in version 3.3: Added the dir_fd parameter.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

os.mknod(path, mode=0o600, device=0, *, dir_fd=None)¶

Create a filesystem node (file, device special file or named pipe) named path. mode specifies both the permissions to use and the type of node to be created, being combined (bitwise OR) with one of stat.S_IFREG, stat.S_IFCHR, stat.S_IFBLK, and stat.S_IFIFO (those constants are available in stat). For stat.S_IFCHR and stat.S_IFBLK, device defines the newly created device special file (probably using os.makedev()), otherwise it is ignored.

This function can also support paths relative to directory descriptors.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

Changed in version 3.3: Added the dir_fd parameter.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

os.major(device, /)¶: Extract the device major number from a raw device number (usually the st_dev or st_rdev field from stat).

os.minor(device, /)¶: Extract the device minor number from a raw device number (usually the st_dev or st_rdev field from stat).

os.makedev(major, minor, /)¶: Compose a raw device number from the major and minor device numbers.

os.pathconf(path, name)¶

Return system configuration information relevant to a named file. name specifies the configuration value to retrieve; it may be a string which is the name of a defined system value; these names are specified in a number of standards (POSIX.1, Unix 95, Unix 98, and others). Some platforms define additional names as well. The names known to the host operating system are given in the pathconf_names dictionary. For configuration variables not included in that mapping, passing an integer for name is also accepted.

This function can support specifying a file descriptor.

Availability: Unix.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

os.pathconf_names¶: Dictionary mapping names accepted by pathconf() and fpathconf() to the integer values defined for those names by the host operating system. This can be used to determine the set of names known to the system.

Availability: Unix.

os.readlink(path, *, dir_fd=None)¶

Return a string representing the path to which the symbolic link points. The result may be either an absolute or relative pathname; if it is relative, it may be converted to an absolute pathname using os.path.join(os.path.dirname(path), result).

If the path is a string object (directly or indirectly through a PathLike interface), the result will also be a string object, and the call may raise a UnicodeDecodeError. If the path is a bytes object (direct or indirectly), the result will be a bytes object.

This function can also support paths relative to directory descriptors.

When trying to resolve a path that may contain links, use realpath() to properly handle recursion and platform differences.

Availability: Unix, Windows.

Changed in version 3.2: Added support for Windows 6.0 (Vista) symbolic links.

Changed in version 3.3: Added the dir_fd parameter.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object on Unix.

Changed in version 3.8: Accepts a path-like object and a bytes object on Windows.

Added support for directory junctions, and changed to return the substitution path (which typically includes \\?\ prefix) rather than the optional “print name” field that was previously returned.

os.remove(path, *, dir_fd=None)¶

Remove (delete) the file path. If path is a directory, an OSError is raised. Use rmdir() to remove directories. If the file does not exist, a FileNotFoundError is raised.

This function can support paths relative to directory descriptors.

On Windows, attempting to remove a file that is in use causes an exception to be raised; on Unix, the directory entry is removed but the storage allocated to the file is not made available until the original file is no longer in use.

This function is semantically identical to unlink().

Raises an auditing event os.remove with arguments path, dir_fd.

Changed in version 3.3: Added the dir_fd parameter.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

os.removedirs(name)¶

Remove directories recursively. Works like rmdir() except that, if the leaf directory is successfully removed, removedirs() tries to successively remove every parent directory mentioned in path until an error is raised (which is ignored, because it generally means that a parent directory is not empty). For example, os.removedirs('foo/bar/baz') will first remove the directory 'foo/bar/baz', and then remove 'foo/bar' and 'foo' if they are empty. Raises OSError if the leaf directory could not be successfully removed.

Raises an auditing event os.remove with arguments path, dir_fd.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

os.rename(src, dst, *, src_dir_fd=None, dst_dir_fd=None)¶

Rename the file or directory src to dst. If dst exists, the operation will fail with an OSError subclass in a number of cases:

On Windows, if dst exists a FileExistsError is always raised. The operation may fail if src and dst are on different filesystems. Use shutil.move() to support moves to a different filesystem.

On Unix, if src is a file and dst is a directory or vice-versa, an IsADirectoryError or a NotADirectoryError will be raised respectively. If both are directories and dst is empty, dst will be silently replaced. If dst is a non-empty directory, an OSError is raised. If both are files, dst will be replaced silently if the user has permission. The operation may fail on some Unix flavors if src and dst are on different filesystems. If successful, the renaming will be an atomic operation (this is a POSIX requirement).

This function can support specifying src_dir_fd and/or dst_dir_fd to supply paths relative to directory descriptors.

If you want cross-platform overwriting of the destination, use replace().

Raises an auditing event os.rename with arguments src, dst, src_dir_fd, dst_dir_fd.

Changed in version 3.3: Added the src_dir_fd and dst_dir_fd parameters.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object for src and dst.

os.renames(old, new)¶

Recursive directory or file renaming function. Works like rename(), except creation of any intermediate directories needed to make the new pathname good is attempted first. After the rename, directories corresponding to rightmost path segments of the old name will be pruned away using removedirs().

Note

This function can fail with the new directory structure made if you lack permissions needed to remove the leaf directory or file.

Raises an auditing event os.rename with arguments src, dst, src_dir_fd, dst_dir_fd.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object for old and new.

os.replace(src, dst, *, src_dir_fd=None, dst_dir_fd=None)¶

Rename the file or directory src to dst. If dst is a non-empty directory, OSError will be raised. If dst exists and is a file, it will be replaced silently if the user has permission. The operation may fail if src and dst are on different filesystems. If successful, the renaming will be an atomic operation (this is a POSIX requirement).

This function can support specifying src_dir_fd and/or dst_dir_fd to supply paths relative to directory descriptors.

Raises an auditing event os.rename with arguments src, dst, src_dir_fd, dst_dir_fd.

Added in version 3.3.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object for src and dst.

os.rmdir(path, *, dir_fd=None)¶

Remove (delete) the directory path. If the directory does not exist or is not empty, a FileNotFoundError or an OSError is raised respectively. In order to remove whole directory trees, shutil.rmtree() can be used.

This function can support paths relative to directory descriptors.

Raises an auditing event os.rmdir with arguments path, dir_fd.

Changed in version 3.3: Added the dir_fd parameter.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

os.scandir(path='.')¶

Return an iterator of os.DirEntry objects corresponding to the entries in the directory given by path. The entries are yielded in arbitrary order, and the special entries '.' and '..' are not included. If a file is removed from or added to the directory after creating the iterator, whether an entry for that file be included is unspecified.

Using scandir() instead of listdir() can significantly increase the performance of code that also needs file type or file attribute information, because os.DirEntry objects expose this information if the operating system provides it when scanning a directory. All os.DirEntry methods may perform a system call, but is_dir() and is_file() usually only require a system call for symbolic links; os.DirEntry.stat() always requires a system call on Unix but only requires one for symbolic links on Windows.

path may be a path-like object. If path is of type bytes (directly or indirectly through the PathLike interface), the type of the name and path attributes of each os.DirEntry will be bytes; in all other circumstances, they will be of type str.

This function can also support specifying a file descriptor; the file descriptor must refer to a directory.

Raises an auditing event os.scandir with argument path.

The scandir() iterator supports the context manager protocol and has the following method:

scandir.close()¶

Close the iterator and free acquired resources.

This is called automatically when the iterator is exhausted or garbage collected, or when an error happens during iterating. However it is advisable to call it explicitly or use the with statement.

Added in version 3.6.

The following example shows a simple use of scandir() to display all the files (excluding directories) in the given path that don’t start with '.'. The entry.is_file() call will generally not make an additional system call:

with os.scandir(path) as it:
    for entry in it:
        if not entry.name.startswith('.') and entry.is_file():
            print(entry.name)

Note

On Unix-based systems, scandir() uses the system’s opendir() and readdir() functions. On Windows, it uses the Win32 FindFirstFileW and FindNextFileW functions.

Added in version 3.5.

Changed in version 3.6: Added support for the context manager protocol and the close() method. If a scandir() iterator is neither exhausted nor explicitly closed a ResourceWarning will be emitted in its destructor.

The function accepts a path-like object.

Changed in version 3.7: Added support for file descriptors on Unix.

class os.DirEntry¶

Object yielded by scandir() to expose the file path and other file attributes of a directory entry.

scandir() will provide as much of this information as possible without making additional system calls. When a stat() or lstat() system call is made, the os.DirEntry object will cache the result.

os.DirEntry instances are not intended to be stored in long-lived data structures; if you know the file metadata has changed or if a long time has elapsed since calling scandir(), call os.stat(entry.path) to fetch up-to-date information.

Because the os.DirEntry methods can make operating system calls, they may also raise OSError. If you need very fine-grained control over errors, you can catch OSError when calling one of the os.DirEntry methods and handle as appropriate.

To be directly usable as a path-like object, os.DirEntry implements the PathLike interface.

Attributes and methods on a os.DirEntry instance are as follows:

name¶

The entry’s base filename, relative to the scandir() path argument.

The name attribute will be bytes if the scandir() path argument is of type bytes and str otherwise. Use fsdecode() to decode byte filenames.

path¶

The entry’s full path name: equivalent to os.path.join(scandir_path, entry.name) where scandir_path is the scandir() path argument. The path is only absolute if the scandir() path argument was absolute. If the scandir() path argument was a file descriptor, the path attribute is the same as the name attribute.

The path attribute will be bytes if the scandir() path argument is of type bytes and str otherwise. Use fsdecode() to decode byte filenames.

inode()¶

Return the inode number of the entry.

The result is cached on the os.DirEntry object. Use os.stat(entry.path, follow_symlinks=False).st_ino to fetch up-to-date information.

On the first, uncached call, a system call is required on Windows but not on Unix.

is_dir(*, follow_symlinks=True)¶

Return True if this entry is a directory or a symbolic link pointing to a directory; return False if the entry is or points to any other kind of file, or if it doesn’t exist anymore.

If follow_symlinks is False, return True only if this entry is a directory (without following symlinks); return False if the entry is any other kind of file or if it doesn’t exist anymore.

The result is cached on the os.DirEntry object, with a separate cache for follow_symlinks True and False. Call os.stat() along with stat.S_ISDIR() to fetch up-to-date information.

On the first, uncached call, no system call is required in most cases. Specifically, for non-symlinks, neither Windows or Unix require a system call, except on certain Unix file systems, such as network file systems, that return dirent.d_type == DT_UNKNOWN. If the entry is a symlink, a system call will be required to follow the symlink unless follow_symlinks is False.

This method can raise OSError, such as PermissionError, but FileNotFoundError is caught and not raised.

is_file(*, follow_symlinks=True)¶

Return True if this entry is a file or a symbolic link pointing to a file; return False if the entry is or points to a directory or other non-file entry, or if it doesn’t exist anymore.

If follow_symlinks is False, return True only if this entry is a file (without following symlinks); return False if the entry is a directory or other non-file entry, or if it doesn’t exist anymore.

The result is cached on the os.DirEntry object. Caching, system calls made, and exceptions raised are as per is_dir().

is_symlink()¶

Return True if this entry is a symbolic link (even if broken); return False if the entry points to a directory or any kind of file, or if it doesn’t exist anymore.

The result is cached on the os.DirEntry object. Call os.path.islink() to fetch up-to-date information.

On the first, uncached call, no system call is required in most cases. Specifically, neither Windows or Unix require a system call, except on certain Unix file systems, such as network file systems, that return dirent.d_type == DT_UNKNOWN.

This method can raise OSError, such as PermissionError, but FileNotFoundError is caught and not raised.

is_junction()¶

Return True if this entry is a junction (even if broken); return False if the entry points to a regular directory, any kind of file, a symlink, or if it doesn’t exist anymore.

The result is cached on the os.DirEntry object. Call os.path.isjunction() to fetch up-to-date information.

Added in version 3.12.

stat(*, follow_symlinks=True)¶

Return a stat_result object for this entry. This method follows symbolic links by default; to stat a symbolic link add the follow_symlinks=False argument.

On Unix, this method always requires a system call. On Windows, it only requires a system call if follow_symlinks is True and the entry is a reparse point (for example, a symbolic link or directory junction).

On Windows, the st_ino, st_dev and st_nlink attributes of the stat_result are always set to zero. Call os.stat() to get these attributes.

The result is cached on the os.DirEntry object, with a separate cache for follow_symlinks True and False. Call os.stat() to fetch up-to-date information.

Note that there is a nice correspondence between several attributes and methods of os.DirEntry and of pathlib.Path. In particular, the name attribute has the same meaning, as do the is_dir(), is_file(), is_symlink(), is_junction(), and stat() methods.

Added in version 3.5.

Changed in version 3.6: Added support for the PathLike interface. Added support for bytes paths on Windows.

Changed in version 3.12: The st_ctime attribute of a stat result is deprecated on Windows. The file creation time is properly available as st_birthtime, and in the future st_ctime may be changed to return zero or the metadata change time, if available.

os.stat(path, *, dir_fd=None, follow_symlinks=True)¶

Get the status of a file or a file descriptor. Perform the equivalent of a stat() system call on the given path. path may be specified as either a string or bytes – directly or indirectly through the PathLike interface – or as an open file descriptor. Return a stat_result object.

This function normally follows symlinks; to stat a symlink add the argument follow_symlinks=False, or use lstat().

This function can support specifying a file descriptor and not following symlinks.

On Windows, passing follow_symlinks=False will disable following all name-surrogate reparse points, which includes symlinks and directory junctions. Other types of reparse points that do not resemble links or that the operating system is unable to follow will be opened directly. When following a chain of multiple links, this may result in the original link being returned instead of the non-link that prevented full traversal. To obtain stat results for the final path in this case, use the os.path.realpath() function to resolve the path name as far as possible and call lstat() on the result. This does not apply to dangling symlinks or junction points, which will raise the usual exceptions.

Example:

>>> import os
>>> statinfo = os.stat('somefile.txt')
>>> statinfo
os.stat_result(st_mode=33188, st_ino=7876932, st_dev=234881026,
st_nlink=1, st_uid=501, st_gid=501, st_size=264, st_atime=1297230295,
st_mtime=1297230027, st_ctime=1297230027)
>>> statinfo.st_size
264

See also

fstat() and lstat() functions.

Changed in version 3.3: Added the dir_fd and follow_symlinks parameters, specifying a file descriptor instead of a path.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

Changed in version 3.8: On Windows, all reparse points that can be resolved by the operating system are now followed, and passing follow_symlinks=False disables following all name surrogate reparse points. If the operating system reaches a reparse point that it is not able to follow, stat now returns the information for the original path as if follow_symlinks=False had been specified instead of raising an error.

class os.stat_result¶

Object whose attributes correspond roughly to the members of the stat structure. It is used for the result of os.stat(), os.fstat() and os.lstat().

Attributes:

st_mode¶: File mode: file type and file mode bits (permissions).

st_ino¶

Platform dependent, but if non-zero, uniquely identifies the file for a given value of st_dev. Typically:

the inode number on Unix,
the file index on Windows

st_dev¶: Identifier of the device on which this file resides.

st_nlink¶: Number of hard links.

st_uid¶: User identifier of the file owner.

st_gid¶: Group identifier of the file owner.

st_size¶: Size of the file in bytes, if it is a regular file or a symbolic link. The size of a symbolic link is the length of the pathname it contains, without a terminating null byte.

Timestamps:

st_atime¶: Time of most recent access expressed in seconds.

st_mtime¶: Time of most recent content modification expressed in seconds.

st_ctime¶: Time of most recent metadata change expressed in seconds.

Changed in version 3.12: st_ctime is deprecated on Windows. Use st_birthtime for the file creation time. In the future, st_ctime will contain the time of the most recent metadata change, as for other platforms.

st_atime_ns¶: Time of most recent access expressed in nanoseconds as an integer.

Added in version 3.3.

st_mtime_ns¶: Time of most recent content modification expressed in nanoseconds as an integer.

Added in version 3.3.

st_ctime_ns¶: Time of most recent metadata change expressed in nanoseconds as an integer.

Added in version 3.3.

Changed in version 3.12: st_ctime_ns is deprecated on Windows. Use st_birthtime_ns for the file creation time. In the future, st_ctime will contain the time of the most recent metadata change, as for other platforms.

st_birthtime¶: Time of file creation expressed in seconds. This attribute is not always available, and may raise AttributeError.

Changed in version 3.12: st_birthtime is now available on Windows.

st_birthtime_ns¶: Time of file creation expressed in nanoseconds as an integer. This attribute is not always available, and may raise AttributeError.

Added in version 3.12.

Note

The exact meaning and resolution of the st_atime, st_mtime, st_ctime and st_birthtime attributes depend on the operating system and the file system. For example, on Windows systems using the FAT32 file systems, st_mtime has 2-second resolution, and st_atime has only 1-day resolution. See your operating system documentation for details.

Similarly, although st_atime_ns, st_mtime_ns, st_ctime_ns and st_birthtime_ns are always expressed in nanoseconds, many systems do not provide nanosecond precision. On systems that do provide nanosecond precision, the floating-point object used to store st_atime, st_mtime, st_ctime and st_birthtime cannot preserve all of it, and as such will be slightly inexact. If you need the exact timestamps you should always use st_atime_ns, st_mtime_ns, st_ctime_ns and st_birthtime_ns.

On some Unix systems (such as Linux), the following attributes may also be available:

st_blocks¶: Number of 512-byte blocks allocated for file. This may be smaller than st_size/512 when the file has holes.

st_blksize¶: “Preferred” blocksize for efficient file system I/O. Writing to a file in smaller chunks may cause an inefficient read-modify-rewrite.

st_rdev¶: Type of device if an inode device.

st_flags¶: User defined flags for file.

On other Unix systems (such as FreeBSD), the following attributes may be available (but may be only filled out if root tries to use them):

st_gen¶: File generation number.

On Solaris and derivatives, the following attributes may also be available:

st_fstype¶: String that uniquely identifies the type of the filesystem that contains the file.

On macOS systems, the following attributes may also be available:

st_rsize¶: Real size of the file.

st_creator¶: Creator of the file.

st_type¶: File type.

On Windows systems, the following attributes are also available:

st_file_attributes¶: Windows file attributes: dwFileAttributes member of the BY_HANDLE_FILE_INFORMATION structure returned by GetFileInformationByHandle(). See the FILE_ATTRIBUTE_* <stat.FILE_ATTRIBUTE_ARCHIVE> constants in the stat module.

Added in version 3.5.

st_reparse_tag¶: When st_file_attributes has the FILE_ATTRIBUTE_REPARSE_POINT set, this field contains the tag identifying the type of reparse point. See the IO_REPARSE_TAG_* constants in the stat module.

The standard module stat defines functions and constants that are useful for extracting information from a stat structure. (On Windows, some items are filled with dummy values.)

For backward compatibility, a stat_result instance is also accessible as a tuple of at least 10 integers giving the most important (and portable) members of the stat structure, in the order st_mode, st_ino, st_dev, st_nlink, st_uid, st_gid, st_size, st_atime, st_mtime, st_ctime. More items may be added at the end by some implementations. For compatibility with older Python versions, accessing stat_result as a tuple always returns integers.

Changed in version 3.5: Windows now returns the file index as st_ino when available.

Changed in version 3.7: Added the st_fstype member to Solaris/derivatives.

Changed in version 3.8: Added the st_reparse_tag member on Windows.

Changed in version 3.8: On Windows, the st_mode member now identifies special files as S_IFCHR, S_IFIFO or S_IFBLK as appropriate.

Changed in version 3.12: On Windows, st_ctime is deprecated. Eventually, it will contain the last metadata change time, for consistency with other platforms, but for now still contains creation time. Use st_birthtime for the creation time.

On Windows, st_ino may now be up to 128 bits, depending on the file system. Previously it would not be above 64 bits, and larger file identifiers would be arbitrarily packed.

On Windows, st_rdev no longer returns a value. Previously it would contain the same as st_dev, which was incorrect.

Added the st_birthtime member on Windows.

os.statvfs(path)¶

Perform a statvfs() system call on the given path. The return value is an object whose attributes describe the filesystem on the given path, and correspond to the members of the statvfs structure, namely: f_bsize, f_frsize, f_blocks, f_bfree, f_bavail, f_files, f_ffree, f_favail, f_flag, f_namemax, f_fsid.

Two module-level constants are defined for the f_flag attribute’s bit-flags: if ST_RDONLY is set, the filesystem is mounted read-only, and if ST_NOSUID is set, the semantics of setuid/setgid bits are disabled or not supported.

Additional module-level constants are defined for GNU/glibc based systems. These are ST_NODEV (disallow access to device special files), ST_NOEXEC (disallow program execution), ST_SYNCHRONOUS (writes are synced at once), ST_MANDLOCK (allow mandatory locks on an FS), ST_WRITE (write on file/directory/symlink), ST_APPEND (append-only file), ST_IMMUTABLE (immutable file), ST_NOATIME (do not update access times), ST_NODIRATIME (do not update directory access times), ST_RELATIME (update atime relative to mtime/ctime).

This function can support specifying a file descriptor.

Availability: Unix.

Changed in version 3.2: The ST_RDONLY and ST_NOSUID constants were added.

Changed in version 3.3: Added support for specifying path as an open file descriptor.

Changed in version 3.4: The ST_NODEV, ST_NOEXEC, ST_SYNCHRONOUS, ST_MANDLOCK, ST_WRITE, ST_APPEND, ST_IMMUTABLE, ST_NOATIME, ST_NODIRATIME, and ST_RELATIME constants were added.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

Changed in version 3.7: Added the f_fsid attribute.

os.supports_dir_fd¶

A set object indicating which functions in the os module accept an open file descriptor for their dir_fd parameter. Different platforms provide different features, and the underlying functionality Python uses to implement the dir_fd parameter is not available on all platforms Python supports. For consistency’s sake, functions that may support dir_fd always allow specifying the parameter, but will throw an exception if the functionality is used when it’s not locally available. (Specifying None for dir_fd is always supported on all platforms.)

To check whether a particular function accepts an open file descriptor for its dir_fd parameter, use the in operator on supports_dir_fd. As an example, this expression evaluates to True if os.stat() accepts open file descriptors for dir_fd on the local platform:

os.stat in os.supports_dir_fd

Currently dir_fd parameters only work on Unix platforms; none of them work on Windows.

Added in version 3.3.

os.supports_effective_ids¶

A set object indicating whether os.access() permits specifying True for its effective_ids parameter on the local platform. (Specifying False for effective_ids is always supported on all platforms.) If the local platform supports it, the collection will contain os.access(); otherwise it will be empty.

This expression evaluates to True if os.access() supports effective_ids=True on the local platform:

os.access in os.supports_effective_ids

Currently effective_ids is only supported on Unix platforms; it does not work on Windows.

Added in version 3.3.

os.supports_fd¶

A set object indicating which functions in the os module permit specifying their path parameter as an open file descriptor on the local platform. Different platforms provide different features, and the underlying functionality Python uses to accept open file descriptors as path arguments is not available on all platforms Python supports.

To determine whether a particular function permits specifying an open file descriptor for its path parameter, use the in operator on supports_fd. As an example, this expression evaluates to True if os.chdir() accepts open file descriptors for path on your local platform:

os.chdir in os.supports_fd

Added in version 3.3.

os.supports_follow_symlinks¶

A set object indicating which functions in the os module accept False for their follow_symlinks parameter on the local platform. Different platforms provide different features, and the underlying functionality Python uses to implement follow_symlinks is not available on all platforms Python supports. For consistency’s sake, functions that may support follow_symlinks always allow specifying the parameter, but will throw an exception if the functionality is used when it’s not locally available. (Specifying True for follow_symlinks is always supported on all platforms.)

To check whether a particular function accepts False for its follow_symlinks parameter, use the in operator on supports_follow_symlinks. As an example, this expression evaluates to True if you may specify follow_symlinks=False when calling os.stat() on the local platform:

os.stat in os.supports_follow_symlinks

Added in version 3.3.

os.symlink(src, dst, target_is_directory=False, *, dir_fd=None)¶

Create a symbolic link pointing to src named dst.

On Windows, a symlink represents either a file or a directory, and does not morph to the target dynamically. If the target is present, the type of the symlink will be created to match. Otherwise, the symlink will be created as a directory if target_is_directory is True or a file symlink (the default) otherwise. On non-Windows platforms, target_is_directory is ignored.

This function can support paths relative to directory descriptors.

Note

On newer versions of Windows 10, unprivileged accounts can create symlinks if Developer Mode is enabled. When Developer Mode is not available/enabled, the SeCreateSymbolicLinkPrivilege privilege is required, or the process must be run as an administrator.

OSError is raised when the function is called by an unprivileged user.

Raises an auditing event os.symlink with arguments src, dst, dir_fd.

Availability: Unix, Windows.

The function is limited on WASI, see WebAssembly platforms for more information.

Changed in version 3.2: Added support for Windows 6.0 (Vista) symbolic links.

Changed in version 3.3: Added the dir_fd parameter, and now allow target_is_directory on non-Windows platforms.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object for src and dst.

Changed in version 3.8: Added support for unelevated symlinks on Windows with Developer Mode.

os.sync()¶: Force write of everything to disk.

Availability: Unix.

Added in version 3.3.

os.truncate(path, length)¶

Truncate the file corresponding to path, so that it is at most length bytes in size.

This function can support specifying a file descriptor.

Raises an auditing event os.truncate with arguments path, length.

Availability: Unix, Windows.

Added in version 3.3.

Changed in version 3.5: Added support for Windows

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

os.unlink(path, *, dir_fd=None)¶

Remove (delete) the file path. This function is semantically identical to remove(); the unlink name is its traditional Unix name. Please see the documentation for remove() for further information.

Raises an auditing event os.remove with arguments path, dir_fd.

Changed in version 3.3: Added the dir_fd parameter.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

os.utime(path, times=None, *, [ns, ]dir_fd=None, follow_symlinks=True)¶

Set the access and modified times of the file specified by path.

utime() takes two optional parameters, times and ns. These specify the times set on path and are used as follows:

If ns is specified, it must be a 2-tuple of the form (atime_ns, mtime_ns) where each member is an int expressing nanoseconds.
If times is not None, it must be a 2-tuple of the form (atime, mtime) where each member is an int or float expressing seconds.
If times is None and ns is unspecified, this is equivalent to specifying ns=(atime_ns, mtime_ns) where both times are the current time.

It is an error to specify tuples for both times and ns.

Note that the exact times you set here may not be returned by a subsequent stat() call, depending on the resolution with which your operating system records access and modification times; see stat(). The best way to preserve exact times is to use the st_atime_ns and st_mtime_ns fields from the os.stat() result object with the ns parameter to utime().

This function can support specifying a file descriptor, paths relative to directory descriptors and not following symlinks.

Raises an auditing event os.utime with arguments path, times, ns, dir_fd.

Changed in version 3.3: Added support for specifying path as an open file descriptor, and the dir_fd, follow_symlinks, and ns parameters.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

os.walk(top, topdown=True, onerror=None, followlinks=False)¶

Generate the file names in a directory tree by walking the tree either top-down or bottom-up. For each directory in the tree rooted at directory top (including top itself), it yields a 3-tuple (dirpath, dirnames, filenames).

dirpath is a string, the path to the directory. dirnames is a list of the names of the subdirectories in dirpath (including symlinks to directories, and excluding '.' and '..'). filenames is a list of the names of the non-directory files in dirpath. Note that the names in the lists contain no path components. To get a full path (which begins with top) to a file or directory in dirpath, do os.path.join(dirpath, name). Whether or not the lists are sorted depends on the file system. If a file is removed from or added to the dirpath directory during generating the lists, whether a name for that file be included is unspecified.

If optional argument topdown is True or not specified, the triple for a directory is generated before the triples for any of its subdirectories (directories are generated top-down). If topdown is False, the triple for a directory is generated after the triples for all of its subdirectories (directories are generated bottom-up). No matter the value of topdown, the list of subdirectories is retrieved before the tuples for the directory and its subdirectories are generated.

When topdown is True, the caller can modify the dirnames list in-place (perhaps using del or slice assignment), and walk() will only recurse into the subdirectories whose names remain in dirnames; this can be used to prune the search, impose a specific order of visiting, or even to inform walk() about directories the caller creates or renames before it resumes walk() again. Modifying dirnames when topdown is False has no effect on the behavior of the walk, because in bottom-up mode the directories in dirnames are generated before dirpath itself is generated.

By default, errors from the scandir() call are ignored. If optional argument onerror is specified, it should be a function; it will be called with one argument, an OSError instance. It can report the error to continue with the walk, or raise the exception to abort the walk. Note that the filename is available as the filename attribute of the exception object.

By default, walk() will not walk down into symbolic links that resolve to directories. Set followlinks to True to visit directories pointed to by symlinks, on systems that support them.

Note

Be aware that setting followlinks to True can lead to infinite recursion if a link points to a parent directory of itself. walk() does not keep track of the directories it visited already.

Note

If you pass a relative pathname, don’t change the current working directory between resumptions of walk(). walk() never changes the current directory, and assumes that its caller doesn’t either.

This example displays the number of bytes taken by non-directory files in each directory under the starting directory, except that it doesn’t look under any __pycache__ subdirectory:

import os
from os.path import join, getsize
for root, dirs, files in os.walk('python/Lib/xml'):
    print(root, "consumes", end=" ")
    print(sum(getsize(join(root, name)) for name in files), end=" ")
    print("bytes in", len(files), "non-directory files")
    if '__pycache__' in dirs:
        dirs.remove('__pycache__')  # don't visit __pycache__ directories

In the next example (simple implementation of shutil.rmtree()), walking the tree bottom-up is essential, rmdir() doesn’t allow deleting a directory before the directory is empty:

# Delete everything reachable from the directory named in "top",
# assuming there are no symbolic links.
# CAUTION:  This is dangerous!  For example, if top == '/', it
# could delete all your disk files.
import os
for root, dirs, files in os.walk(top, topdown=False):
    for name in files:
        os.remove(os.path.join(root, name))
    for name in dirs:
        os.rmdir(os.path.join(root, name))
os.rmdir(top)

Raises an auditing event os.walk with arguments top, topdown, onerror, followlinks.

Changed in version 3.5: This function now calls os.scandir() instead of os.listdir(), making it faster by reducing the number of calls to os.stat().

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

os.fwalk(top='.', topdown=True, onerror=None, *, follow_symlinks=False, dir_fd=None)¶

This behaves exactly like walk(), except that it yields a 4-tuple (dirpath, dirnames, filenames, dirfd), and it supports dir_fd.

dirpath, dirnames and filenames are identical to walk() output, and dirfd is a file descriptor referring to the directory dirpath.

This function always supports paths relative to directory descriptors and not following symlinks. Note however that, unlike other functions, the fwalk() default value for follow_symlinks is False.

Note

Since fwalk() yields file descriptors, those are only valid until the next iteration step, so you should duplicate them (e.g. with dup()) if you want to keep them longer.

This example displays the number of bytes taken by non-directory files in each directory under the starting directory, except that it doesn’t look under any __pycache__ subdirectory:

import os
for root, dirs, files, rootfd in os.fwalk('python/Lib/xml'):
    print(root, "consumes", end=" ")
    print(sum([os.stat(name, dir_fd=rootfd).st_size for name in files]),
          end=" ")
    print("bytes in", len(files), "non-directory files")
    if '__pycache__' in dirs:
        dirs.remove('__pycache__')  # don't visit __pycache__ directories

In the next example, walking the tree bottom-up is essential: rmdir() doesn’t allow deleting a directory before the directory is empty:

# Delete everything reachable from the directory named in "top",
# assuming there are no symbolic links.
# CAUTION:  This is dangerous!  For example, if top == '/', it
# could delete all your disk files.
import os
for root, dirs, files, rootfd in os.fwalk(top, topdown=False):
    for name in files:
        os.unlink(name, dir_fd=rootfd)
    for name in dirs:
        os.rmdir(name, dir_fd=rootfd)

Raises an auditing event os.fwalk with arguments top, topdown, onerror, follow_symlinks, dir_fd.

Availability: Unix.

Added in version 3.3.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

Changed in version 3.7: Added support for bytes paths.

os.memfd_create(name[, flags=os.MFD_CLOEXEC])¶

Create an anonymous file and return a file descriptor that refers to it. flags must be one of the os.MFD_* constants available on the system (or a bitwise ORed combination of them). By default, the new file descriptor is non-inheritable.

The name supplied in name is used as a filename and will be displayed as the target of the corresponding symbolic link in the directory /proc/self/fd/. The displayed name is always prefixed with memfd: and serves only for debugging purposes. Names do not affect the behavior of the file descriptor, and as such multiple files can have the same name without any side effects.

Availability: Linux >= 3.17 with glibc >= 2.27.

Added in version 3.8.

os.MFD_CLOEXEC¶
os.MFD_ALLOW_SEALING¶
os.MFD_HUGETLB¶
os.MFD_HUGE_SHIFT¶
os.MFD_HUGE_MASK¶
os.MFD_HUGE_64KB¶
os.MFD_HUGE_512KB¶
os.MFD_HUGE_1MB¶
os.MFD_HUGE_2MB¶
os.MFD_HUGE_8MB¶
os.MFD_HUGE_16MB¶
os.MFD_HUGE_32MB¶
os.MFD_HUGE_256MB¶
os.MFD_HUGE_512MB¶
os.MFD_HUGE_1GB¶
os.MFD_HUGE_2GB¶
os.MFD_HUGE_16GB¶: These flags can be passed to memfd_create().

Availability: Linux >= 3.17 with glibc >= 2.27

The MFD_HUGE* flags are only available since Linux 4.14.

Added in version 3.8.

os.eventfd(initval[, flags=os.EFD_CLOEXEC])¶

Create and return an event file descriptor. The file descriptors supports raw read() and write() with a buffer size of 8, select(), poll() and similar. See man page eventfd(2) for more information. By default, the new file descriptor is non-inheritable.

initval is the initial value of the event counter. The initial value must be a 32 bit unsigned integer. Please note that the initial value is limited to a 32 bit unsigned int although the event counter is an unsigned 64 bit integer with a maximum value of 2⁶⁴-2.

flags can be constructed from EFD_CLOEXEC, EFD_NONBLOCK, and EFD_SEMAPHORE.

If EFD_SEMAPHORE is specified and the event counter is non-zero, eventfd_read() returns 1 and decrements the counter by one.

If EFD_SEMAPHORE is not specified and the event counter is non-zero, eventfd_read() returns the current event counter value and resets the counter to zero.

If the event counter is zero and EFD_NONBLOCK is not specified, eventfd_read() blocks.

eventfd_write() increments the event counter. Write blocks if the write operation would increment the counter to a value larger than 2⁶⁴-2.

Example:

import os

# semaphore with start value '1'
fd = os.eventfd(1, os.EFD_SEMAPHORE | os.EFC_CLOEXEC)
try:
    # acquire semaphore
    v = os.eventfd_read(fd)
    try:
        do_work()
    finally:
        # release semaphore
        os.eventfd_write(fd, v)
finally:
    os.close(fd)

Availability: Linux >= 2.6.27 with glibc >= 2.8

Added in version 3.10.

os.eventfd_read(fd)¶: Read value from an eventfd() file descriptor and return a 64 bit unsigned int. The function does not verify that fd is an eventfd().

Availability: Linux >= 2.6.27

Added in version 3.10.

os.eventfd_write(fd, value)¶: Add value to an eventfd() file descriptor. value must be a 64 bit unsigned int. The function does not verify that fd is an eventfd().

Availability: Linux >= 2.6.27

Added in version 3.10.

os.EFD_CLOEXEC¶: Set close-on-exec flag for new eventfd() file descriptor.

Availability: Linux >= 2.6.27

Added in version 3.10.

os.EFD_NONBLOCK¶: Set O_NONBLOCK status flag for new eventfd() file descriptor.

Availability: Linux >= 2.6.27

Added in version 3.10.

os.EFD_SEMAPHORE¶: Provide semaphore-like semantics for reads from an eventfd() file descriptor. On read the internal counter is decremented by one.

Availability: Linux >= 2.6.30

Added in version 3.10.

Timer File Descriptors¶

Added in version 3.13.

These functions provide support for Linux’s timer file descriptor API. Naturally, they are all only available on Linux.

os.timerfd_create(clockid, /, *, flags=0)¶

Create and return a timer file descriptor (timerfd).

The file descriptor returned by timerfd_create() supports:

The file descriptor’s read() method can be called with a buffer size of 8. If the timer has already expired one or more times, read() returns the number of expirations with the host’s endianness, which may be converted to an int by int.from_bytes(x, byteorder=sys.byteorder).

select() and poll() can be used to wait until timer expires and the file descriptor is readable.

clockid must be a valid clock ID, as defined in the time module:

time.CLOCK_REALTIME
time.CLOCK_MONOTONIC
time.CLOCK_BOOTTIME (Since Linux 3.15 for timerfd_create)

If clockid is time.CLOCK_REALTIME, a settable system-wide real-time clock is used. If system clock is changed, timer setting need to be updated. To cancel timer when system clock is changed, see TFD_TIMER_CANCEL_ON_SET.

If clockid is time.CLOCK_MONOTONIC, a non-settable monotonically increasing clock is used. Even if the system clock is changed, the timer setting will not be affected.

If clockid is time.CLOCK_BOOTTIME, same as time.CLOCK_MONOTONIC except it includes any time that the system is suspended.

The file descriptor’s behaviour can be modified by specifying a flags value. Any of the following variables may used, combined using bitwise OR (the | operator):

If TFD_NONBLOCK is not set as a flag, read() blocks until the timer expires. If it is set as a flag, read() doesn’t block, but If there hasn’t been an expiration since the last call to read, read() raises OSError with errno is set to errno.EAGAIN.

TFD_CLOEXEC is always set by Python automatically.

The file descriptor must be closed with os.close() when it is no longer needed, or else the file descriptor will be leaked.

See also

The timerfd_create(2) man page.

Availability: Linux >= 2.6.27 with glibc >= 2.8

Added in version 3.13.

os.timerfd_settime(fd, /, *, flags=flags, initial=0.0, interval=0.0)¶

Alter a timer file descriptor’s internal timer. This function operates the same interval timer as timerfd_settime_ns().

fd must be a valid timer file descriptor.

The timer’s behaviour can be modified by specifying a flags value. Any of the following variables may used, combined using bitwise OR (the | operator):

The timer is disabled by setting initial to zero (0). If initial is equal to or greater than zero, the timer is enabled. If initial is less than zero, it raises an OSError exception with errno set to errno.EINVAL

By default the timer will fire when initial seconds have elapsed. (If initial is zero, timer will fire immediately.)

However, if the TFD_TIMER_ABSTIME flag is set, the timer will fire when the timer’s clock (set by clockid in timerfd_create()) reaches initial seconds.

The timer’s interval is set by the interval float. If interval is zero, the timer only fires once, on the initial expiration. If interval is greater than zero, the timer fires every time interval seconds have elapsed since the previous expiration. If interval is less than zero, it raises OSError with errno set to errno.EINVAL

If the TFD_TIMER_CANCEL_ON_SET flag is set along with TFD_TIMER_ABSTIME and the clock for this timer is time.CLOCK_REALTIME, the timer is marked as cancelable if the real-time clock is changed discontinuously. Reading the descriptor is aborted with the error ECANCELED.

Linux manages system clock as UTC. A daylight-savings time transition is done by changing time offset only and doesn’t cause discontinuous system clock change.

Discontinuous system clock change will be caused by the following events:

settimeofday
clock_settime
set the system date and time by date command

Return a two-item tuple of (next_expiration, interval) from the previous timer state, before this function executed.

Availability: Linux >= 2.6.27 with glibc >= 2.8

Added in version 3.13.

os.timerfd_settime_ns(fd, /, *, flags=0, initial=0, interval=0)¶: Similar to timerfd_settime(), but use time as nanoseconds. This function operates the same interval timer as timerfd_settime().

Availability: Linux >= 2.6.27 with glibc >= 2.8

Added in version 3.13.

os.timerfd_gettime(fd, /)¶

Return a two-item tuple of floats (next_expiration, interval).

next_expiration denotes the relative time until next the timer next fires, regardless of if the TFD_TIMER_ABSTIME flag is set.

interval denotes the timer’s interval. If zero, the timer will only fire once, after next_expiration seconds have elapsed.

See also

timerfd_gettime(2)

Availability: Linux >= 2.6.27 with glibc >= 2.8

Added in version 3.13.

os.timerfd_gettime_ns(fd, /)¶: Similar to timerfd_gettime(), but return time as nanoseconds.

Availability: Linux >= 2.6.27 with glibc >= 2.8

Added in version 3.13.

os.TFD_NONBLOCK¶: A flag for the timerfd_create() function, which sets the O_NONBLOCK status flag for the new timer file descriptor. If TFD_NONBLOCK is not set as a flag, read() blocks.

Availability: Linux >= 2.6.27 with glibc >= 2.8

Added in version 3.13.

os.TFD_CLOEXEC¶: A flag for the timerfd_create() function, If TFD_CLOEXEC is set as a flag, set close-on-exec flag for new file descriptor.

Availability: Linux >= 2.6.27 with glibc >= 2.8

Added in version 3.13.

os.TFD_TIMER_ABSTIME¶: A flag for the timerfd_settime() and timerfd_settime_ns() functions. If this flag is set, initial is interpreted as an absolute value on the timer’s clock (in UTC seconds or nanoseconds since the Unix Epoch).

Availability: Linux >= 2.6.27 with glibc >= 2.8

Added in version 3.13.

os.TFD_TIMER_CANCEL_ON_SET¶: A flag for the timerfd_settime() and timerfd_settime_ns() functions along with TFD_TIMER_ABSTIME. The timer is cancelled when the time of the underlying clock changes discontinuously.

Availability: Linux >= 2.6.27 with glibc >= 2.8

Added in version 3.13.

Linux extended attributes¶

Added in version 3.3.

These functions are all available on Linux only.

os.getxattr(path, attribute, *, follow_symlinks=True)¶

Return the value of the extended filesystem attribute attribute for path. attribute can be bytes or str (directly or indirectly through the PathLike interface). If it is str, it is encoded with the filesystem encoding.

This function can support specifying a file descriptor and not following symlinks.

Raises an auditing event os.getxattr with arguments path, attribute.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object for path and attribute.

os.listxattr(path=None, *, follow_symlinks=True)¶

Return a list of the extended filesystem attributes on path. The attributes in the list are represented as strings decoded with the filesystem encoding. If path is None, listxattr() will examine the current directory.

This function can support specifying a file descriptor and not following symlinks.

Raises an auditing event os.listxattr with argument path.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

os.removexattr(path, attribute, *, follow_symlinks=True)¶

Removes the extended filesystem attribute attribute from path. attribute should be bytes or str (directly or indirectly through the PathLike interface). If it is a string, it is encoded with the filesystem encoding and error handler.

This function can support specifying a file descriptor and not following symlinks.

Raises an auditing event os.removexattr with arguments path, attribute.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object for path and attribute.

os.setxattr(path, attribute, value, flags=0, *, follow_symlinks=True)¶

Set the extended filesystem attribute attribute on path to value. attribute must be a bytes or str with no embedded NULs (directly or indirectly through the PathLike interface). If it is a str, it is encoded with the filesystem encoding and error handler. flags may be XATTR_REPLACE or XATTR_CREATE. If XATTR_REPLACE is given and the attribute does not exist, ENODATA will be raised. If XATTR_CREATE is given and the attribute already exists, the attribute will not be created and EEXISTS will be raised.

This function can support specifying a file descriptor and not following symlinks.

Note

A bug in Linux kernel versions less than 2.6.39 caused the flags argument to be ignored on some filesystems.

Raises an auditing event os.setxattr with arguments path, attribute, value, flags.

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object for path and attribute.

os.XATTR_SIZE_MAX¶: The maximum size the value of an extended attribute can be. Currently, this is 64 KiB on Linux.

os.XATTR_CREATE¶: This is a possible value for the flags argument in setxattr(). It indicates the operation must create an attribute.

os.XATTR_REPLACE¶: This is a possible value for the flags argument in setxattr(). It indicates the operation must replace an existing attribute.

Process Management¶

These functions may be used to create and manage processes.

The various exec* functions take a list of arguments for the new program loaded into the process. In each case, the first of these arguments is passed to the new program as its own name rather than as an argument a user may have typed on a command line. For the C programmer, this is the argv[0] passed to a program’s main(). For example, os.execv('/bin/echo', ['foo', 'bar']) will only print bar on standard output; foo will seem to be ignored.

os.abort()¶: Generate a SIGABRT signal to the current process. On Unix, the default behavior is to produce a core dump; on Windows, the process immediately returns an exit code of 3. Be aware that calling this function will not call the Python signal handler registered for SIGABRT with signal.signal().

os.add_dll_directory(path)¶

Add a path to the DLL search path.

This search path is used when resolving dependencies for imported extension modules (the module itself is resolved through sys.path), and also by ctypes.

Remove the directory by calling close() on the returned object or using it in a with statement.

See the Microsoft documentation for more information about how DLLs are loaded.

Raises an auditing event os.add_dll_directory with argument path.

Availability: Windows.

Added in version 3.8: Previous versions of CPython would resolve DLLs using the default behavior for the current process. This led to inconsistencies, such as only sometimes searching PATH or the current working directory, and OS functions such as AddDllDirectory having no effect.

In 3.8, the two primary ways DLLs are loaded now explicitly override the process-wide behavior to ensure consistency. See the porting notes for information on updating libraries.

os.execl(path, arg0, arg1, ...)¶

os.execle(path, arg0, arg1, ..., env)¶

os.execlp(file, arg0, arg1, ...)¶

os.execlpe(file, arg0, arg1, ..., env)¶

os.execv(path, args)¶

os.execve(path, args, env)¶

os.execvp(file, args)¶

os.execvpe(file, args, env)¶

These functions all execute a new program, replacing the current process; they do not return. On Unix, the new executable is loaded into the current process, and will have the same process id as the caller. Errors will be reported as OSError exceptions.

The current process is replaced immediately. Open file objects and descriptors are not flushed, so if there may be data buffered on these open files, you should flush them using sys.stdout.flush() or os.fsync() before calling an exec* function.

The “l” and “v” variants of the exec* functions differ in how command-line arguments are passed. The “l” variants are perhaps the easiest to work with if the number of parameters is fixed when the code is written; the individual parameters simply become additional parameters to the execl*() functions. The “v” variants are good when the number of parameters is variable, with the arguments being passed in a list or tuple as the args parameter. In either case, the arguments to the child process should start with the name of the command being run, but this is not enforced.

The variants which include a “p” near the end (execlp(), execlpe(), execvp(), and execvpe()) will use the PATH environment variable to locate the program file. When the environment is being replaced (using one of the exec*e variants, discussed in the next paragraph), the new environment is used as the source of the PATH variable. The other variants, execl(), execle(), execv(), and execve(), will not use the PATH variable to locate the executable; path must contain an appropriate absolute or relative path. Relative paths must include at least one slash, even on Windows, as plain names will not be resolved.

For execle(), execlpe(), execve(), and execvpe() (note that these all end in “e”), the env parameter must be a mapping which is used to define the environment variables for the new process (these are used instead of the current process’ environment); the functions execl(), execlp(), execv(), and execvp() all cause the new process to inherit the environment of the current process.

For execve() on some platforms, path may also be specified as an open file descriptor. This functionality may not be supported on your platform; you can check whether or not it is available using os.supports_fd. If it is unavailable, using it will raise a NotImplementedError.

Raises an auditing event os.exec with arguments path, args, env.

Availability: Unix, Windows, not WASI, not Android, not iOS.

Changed in version 3.3: Added support for specifying path as an open file descriptor for execve().

Changed in version 3.6: Accepts a path-like object.

os._exit(n)¶: Exit the process with status n, without calling cleanup handlers, flushing stdio buffers, etc.

Note

The standard way to exit is sys.exit(n). _exit() should normally only be used in the child process after a fork().

The following exit codes are defined and can be used with _exit(), although they are not required. These are typically used for system programs written in Python, such as a mail server’s external command delivery program.

Note

Some of these may not be available on all Unix platforms, since there is some variation. These constants are defined where they are defined by the underlying platform.

os.EX_OK¶: Exit code that means no error occurred. May be taken from the defined value of EXIT_SUCCESS on some platforms. Generally has a value of zero.

Availability: Unix, Windows.

os.EX_USAGE¶: Exit code that means the command was used incorrectly, such as when the wrong number of arguments are given.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.EX_DATAERR¶: Exit code that means the input data was incorrect.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.EX_NOINPUT¶: Exit code that means an input file did not exist or was not readable.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.EX_NOUSER¶: Exit code that means a specified user did not exist.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.EX_NOHOST¶: Exit code that means a specified host did not exist.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.EX_UNAVAILABLE¶: Exit code that means that a required service is unavailable.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.EX_SOFTWARE¶: Exit code that means an internal software error was detected.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.EX_OSERR¶: Exit code that means an operating system error was detected, such as the inability to fork or create a pipe.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.EX_OSFILE¶: Exit code that means some system file did not exist, could not be opened, or had some other kind of error.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.EX_CANTCREAT¶: Exit code that means a user specified output file could not be created.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.EX_IOERR¶: Exit code that means that an error occurred while doing I/O on some file.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.EX_TEMPFAIL¶: Exit code that means a temporary failure occurred. This indicates something that may not really be an error, such as a network connection that couldn’t be made during a retryable operation.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.EX_PROTOCOL¶: Exit code that means that a protocol exchange was illegal, invalid, or not understood.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.EX_NOPERM¶: Exit code that means that there were insufficient permissions to perform the operation (but not intended for file system problems).

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.EX_CONFIG¶: Exit code that means that some kind of configuration error occurred.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.EX_NOTFOUND¶: Exit code that means something like “an entry was not found”.

Availability: Unix, not WASI.

os.fork()¶

Fork a child process. Return 0 in the child and the child’s process id in the parent. If an error occurs OSError is raised.

Note that some platforms including FreeBSD <= 6.3 and Cygwin have known issues when using fork() from a thread.

Raises an auditing event os.fork with no arguments.

Warning

If you use TLS sockets in an application calling fork(), see the warning in the ssl documentation.

Warning

On macOS the use of this function is unsafe when mixed with using higher-level system APIs, and that includes using urllib.request.

Changed in version 3.8: Calling fork() in a subinterpreter is no longer supported (RuntimeError is raised).

Changed in version 3.12: If Python is able to detect that your process has multiple threads, os.fork() now raises a DeprecationWarning.

We chose to surface this as a warning, when detectable, to better inform developers of a design problem that the POSIX platform specifically notes as not supported. Even in code that appears to work, it has never been safe to mix threading with os.fork() on POSIX platforms. The CPython runtime itself has always made API calls that are not safe for use in the child process when threads existed in the parent (such as malloc and free).

Users of macOS or users of libc or malloc implementations other than those typically found in glibc to date are among those already more likely to experience deadlocks running such code.

See this discussion on fork being incompatible with threads for technical details of why we’re surfacing this longstanding platform compatibility problem to developers.

Availability: POSIX, not WASI, not Android, not iOS.

os.forkpty()¶

Fork a child process, using a new pseudo-terminal as the child’s controlling terminal. Return a pair of (pid, fd), where pid is 0 in the child, the new child’s process id in the parent, and fd is the file descriptor of the master end of the pseudo-terminal. For a more portable approach, use the pty module. If an error occurs OSError is raised.

Raises an auditing event os.forkpty with no arguments.

Warning

On macOS the use of this function is unsafe when mixed with using higher-level system APIs, and that includes using urllib.request.

Changed in version 3.8: Calling forkpty() in a subinterpreter is no longer supported (RuntimeError is raised).

Changed in version 3.12: If Python is able to detect that your process has multiple threads, this now raises a DeprecationWarning. See the longer explanation on os.fork().

Availability: Unix, not WASI, not Android, not iOS.

os.kill(pid, sig, /)¶

Send signal sig to the process pid. Constants for the specific signals available on the host platform are defined in the signal module.

Windows: The signal.CTRL_C_EVENT and signal.CTRL_BREAK_EVENT signals are special signals which can only be sent to console processes which share a common console window, e.g., some subprocesses. Any other value for sig will cause the process to be unconditionally killed by the TerminateProcess API, and the exit code will be set to sig.

os — Miscellaneous operating system interfaces¶

File Names, Command Line Arguments, and Environment Variables¶

Python UTF-8 Mode¶

Process Parameters¶

File Object Creation¶

File Descriptor Operations¶

Querying the size of a terminal¶

Inheritance of File Descriptors¶

Files and Directories¶

Timer File Descriptors¶

Linux extended attributes¶

Process Management¶

`os` — Miscellaneous operating system interfaces¶