best way to get folder and file list in Javascript

Question

I m using node-webkit  and am trying to have a user select a folder  and I ll return the directory structure of that folder and recursively get its children    I ve got this working fairly simply with this code  in an Angular Controller     var fs   require  fs      scope explorer      scope openFile   function         scope explorer    tree entry  scope path            get folder  scope path   scope explorer 0  children       function get folder path  tree       fs readdir path  function err files           if  err  return console log err            files forEach  function  file idx               tree push tree entry file                fs lstat path     file function err stats                   if err  return console log err                   if stats isDirectory                         get folder path     file tree idx  children                                                             console log  scope explorer        return     function tree entry entry       return   label   entry  children          Taking a moderate sized folder with 22 child folders and about 4 levels deep  it is taking a few minutes to get the entire directory structure    Is there something that I m obviously doing wrong here  I can t believe it takes that long  seeing as I m using the built in Node fs methods  Or is there a way to get the entire contents of a directory without touching each and every file    I m going to want to be able to use an Angular filter on the file names all the way down the tree  and possibly on the contents too  so delaying processing the entire tree isn t likely a solution that would work

User · Answer

Why to invent the wheel   There is a very popular NPM package  that let you do things like that easy   var recursive   require  recursive-readdir     recursive  some path   function  err  files          files  is an array of file paths   console log files         Lear more    https   www npmjs com package recursive-readdir

User · Answer

I don t like adding new package into my project just to handle this simple task   And also  I try my best to avoid RECURSIVE algorithm     since  for most cases it is slower compared to non Recursive one   So I made a function to get all the folder content  and its sub folder      NON-Recursively  var getDirectoryContent   function dirPath                    get list of files and directories from given dirPath and all it s sub directories         NON RECURSIVE ALGORITHM         By  Dreamsavior            var RESULT     files       dirs            var fs   fs  require  fs        if  Boolean dirPath     false            return RESULT            if  fs existsSync dirPath     false            console warn  Path does not exist      dirPath           return RESULT             var directoryList          var DIRECTORY SEPARATOR             if  dirPath dirPath length -1      DIRECTORY SEPARATOR  dirPath   dirPath DIRECTORY SEPARATOR       directoryList push dirPath      initial      while  directoryList length  gt  0            var thisDir    directoryList shift             if  Boolean fs existsSync thisDir   amp  amp  fs lstatSync thisDir  isDirectory       false  continue           var thisDirContent   fs readdirSync thisDir           while  thisDirContent length  gt  0                 var thisFile    thisDirContent shift                 var objPath   thisDir thisFile              if  fs existsSync objPath     false  continue              if  fs lstatSync objPath  isDirectory         is a directory                 let thisDirPath   objPath DIRECTORY SEPARATOR                   directoryList push thisDirPath                   RESULT  dirs   push thisDirPath                  else       is a file                 RESULT  files   push objPath                                          return RESULT      the only drawback of this function is that this is Synchronous function    You have been warned

User · Answer

In my project I use this function for getting huge amount of files   It s pretty fast  put require  FS   out to make it even faster    var  getAllFilesFromFolder   function dir         var filesystem   require  fs        var results            filesystem readdirSync dir  forEach function file             file   dir     file          var stat   filesystem statSync file            if  stat  amp  amp  stat isDirectory                  results   results concat  getAllFilesFromFolder file             else results push file                 return results        usage is clear    getAllFilesFromFolder   dirname    folder

User · Answer

fs promises and fs Dirent  Here s an efficient  non-blocking ls program using Node s fast fs Dirent objects and fs promises module  This approach allows you to skip wasteful fs exist or fs stat calls on every path -     main js import   readdir   from  fs promises  import   join   from  path   async function  ls  path          yield path   for  const dirent of await readdir path    withFileTypes  true         if  dirent isDirectory          yield  ls join path  dirent name       else       yield join path  dirent name     async function  empty        async function toArray  iter   empty      let r        for await  const x of iter      r push x    return r    toArray ls       then console log  console error    Let s get some sample files so we can see ls working -    yarn add immutable        just some example package    node main js               main js      node modules      node modules  yarn-integrity      node modules immutable      node modules immutable LICENSE      node modules immutable README md      node modules immutable contrib      node modules immutable contrib cursor      node modules immutable contrib cursor README md      node modules immutable contrib cursor   tests        node modules immutable contrib cursor   tests   Cursor ts skip      node modules immutable contrib cursor index d ts      node modules immutable contrib cursor index js      node modules immutable dist      node modules immutable dist immutable-nonambient d ts      node modules immutable dist immutable d ts      node modules immutable dist immutable es js      node modules immutable dist immutable js      node modules immutable dist immutable js flow      node modules immutable dist immutable min js      node modules immutable package json      package json      yarn lock      For added explanation and other ways to leverage async generators  see this Q amp A

[javascript] best way to get folder and file list in Javascript

Lear more:

Examples related to javascript

Examples related to node.js

Examples related to recursion

Examples related to filesystems