Newbie Question: Shell-like Scripting in Python?

[Stephen Ferg]

Here are some routines that I've collected.
Use at your own risk -- they haven't been thoroughly used and tested.

And of course, to use them, you will have to import a few modules like
os, shutil, etc.

Note that you may have to un-wrap a few of the longer lines because
they were wrapped when the message was posted.

-- Steve Ferg (steve at ferg.org)

#--------------------------------------------------------------
# directory utilities
#--------------------------------------------------------------
def d_exists(d):
	"""Return a boolean indicating whether directory d exists."""
	return os.path.isdir(d)

def d_delete(d):
	"""Delete a directory"""
	return os.rmdir(d)

def d_create(d):
	"""Create a directory if it doesn't exist"""
	if d_exists(d): return
	return os.mkdir(d)

def d_current():
	"""return the current working directory"""
	return os.getcwd()

def d_drive(new_driveletter = None):
	"""Optionally, change the drive.
	return the first letter of the drive specification of
	the current directory.
	"""
	old_driveletter = os.path.splitdrive(os.getcwd())[0][:1]
	if new_driveletter == None: pass
	else:
		new_driveletter = new_driveletter[:1] # use only the first letter
		os.chdir( new_driveletter + ":")  # change to the drive indicated by
the new_driveletter
	return old_driveletter


#--------------------------------------------------------------
# file utilities
#--------------------------------------------------------------
def f_exists(f1):
	if type(f1) != types.StringType: raise "Function requires argument of
StringType; received argument of " + `type(f1)`
	f1 = os.path.normcase(f1)
	return os.path.isfile(f1)

def f_list(f_spec, include_directory_name = 0):
	"""return a list of all files that meet a certain filespec
	"""
	import glob
	f_spec = os.path.normcase(f_spec)
	list_of_files = glob.glob(f_spec)
	return list_of_files


def f_delete(f1):
	if type(f1) != types.StringType: raise "Function requires argument of
StringType; received argument of " + `type(f1)`
	# f1 = os.path.normcase(f1)
	#debugging -- if os.path.isfile(f1): print f1, "exists"
	#debugging -- else: print   f1, "does not exist"
	if os.path.isfile(f1):
		return os.remove(f1)

def f_rename(f1,f2):
	"""Rename file with filename f1 to filename f2
	"""
	if type(f1) != types.StringType: raise "Function requires argument of
StringType; received argument of " + `type(f1)`
	if type(f2) != types.StringType: raise "Function requires argument of
StringType; received argument of " + `type(f2)`
	f1 = os.path.normcase(f1)
	f2 = os.path.normcase(f2)
	return os.rename(f1,f2)

def f_copy(f1,f2):
	"""Copy a file with filename f1 to a file with filename f2,
	F1 may contain wildcards (?*), in which case f2 is expected to
contain
	a directory name, and all files matching the wildcard will be copied
	into that directory.
	"""
	if type(f1) != types.StringType: raise "Function requires argument of
StringType; received argument of " + `type(f1)`
	if type(f2) != types.StringType: raise "Function requires argument of
StringType; received argument of " + `type(f2)`
	f1 = os.path.normcase(f1)
	f2 = os.path.normcase(f2)

	if match(f1, "?*") > -1:
		# there were wildcards in the filespec
		# that means that we're trying to copy a set of files to a directory
		filename_list = f_list(f1)
		for filename in filename_list:
			try:
				shutil.copy2(filename,f2)
			except IOError, e:
				print "\nException when attempting to copy \nfilespec: " + f1 +
"\nto dir..: " + f2 + "\n"
				print "\nAttempting to copy \nfilename: " + filename + "\nto
dir..: " + f2 + "\n"
				raise e


	else: # only one file was requiested to be copied
		if not f_exists(f1):
			raise "Cannot copy file " + f1 + " to " + f2 + " -- file does not
exist."

		try: return shutil.copy2(f1,f2)
		except IOError, e:
			print "\nIOError when attempting to copy \nfile: " + f1 + "\nto..:
" + f2 + "\n"
			raise e