Reading file using relative path in python project

Question

Say I have a python project that is structured as follows   project      data         test csv      package           init   py         module py     main py     init   py   from  module import test   module py   import csv  with open    data test csv   as f      test    line for line in csv reader f     main py   import package  print package test    When I run main py I get the following error    C  Users Patrick Desktop project gt python main py Traceback  most recent call last     File  main py   line 1  in  lt module gt      import package   File  C  Users Patrick Desktop project package   init   py   line 1  in  lt module gt      from  module import test   File  C  Users Patrick Desktop project package module py   line 3  in  lt module gt      with open     data test csv   as f  FileNotFoundError   Errno 2  No such file or directory      data test csv    However  if I run module py from the package directory I get no errors  So it seems that the relative path used in open      is only relative to where the originating file is being run from  i e   name         main      I don t want to use absolute paths  What are some ways to deal with this

User · Answer

This worked for me  with open  data test csv   as f

User · Answer

Relative paths are relative to current working directory  If you do not your want your path to be  it must be absolute  But there is an often used trick to build an absolute path from current script  use its   file   special attribute  from pathlib import Path  path   Path   file    parent    quot    data test csv quot  with path open   as f      test   list csv reader f    This requires python 3 4   for the pathlib module   If you still need to support older versions  you can get the same result with  import csv import os path  my path   os path abspath os path dirname   file     path   os path join my path   quot    data test csv quot   with open path  as f      test   list csv reader f     2020 edit  python3 4  should now be the norm  so I moved the pathlib version inspired by jpyams  comment first

User · Answer

try with open f quot  os path dirname sys argv 0    data test csv quot   newline     as f

User · Answer

My Python version is Python 3 5 2 and the solution proposed in the accepted answer didn t work for me  I ve still were given an error  FileNotFoundError   Errno 2  No such file or directory   when I was running my script py from the terminal  Although it worked fine when I run it through Run Debug Configurations from PyCharm IDE  PyCharm 2018 3 2  Community Edition     Solution   instead of using   my path   os path abspath os path dirname   file       some rel dir path    as suggested in the accepted answer  I used   my path   os path abspath os path dirname os path abspath   file        some rel dir path   Explanation  Changing os path dirname   file    to os path dirname os path abspath   file     solves the following problem   When we run our script like that  python3 my script py  the   file   variable has a just a string value of  my script py  without path leading to that particular script  That is why method dirname   file    returns an empty string     That is also the reson why my path   os path abspath os path dirname   file       some rel dir path is actually the same thing as my path   some rel dir path  Consequently FileNotFoundError   Errno 2  No such file or directory is given when trying to use open method because there is no directory like  some rel dir path    Running script from PyCharm IDE Running Debug Configurations worked because it runs a command python3  full path to my script py  where   full path to  is specified by us in  Working directory  variable in Run Debug Configurations  instead of justpython3 my script py like it is done when we run it from the terminal   Hope that will be useful

User · Answer

For Python 3 4    import csv from pathlib import Path  base path   Path   file    parent file path    base path       data test csv   resolve    with open file path  as f      test    line for line in csv reader f

User · Answer

I was thundered when the following code worked  import os  for file in os listdir  quot    FutureBookList quot        if file endswith  quot  adoc quot            filename  file extension   os path splitext file          print filename          print file extension          continue     else          continue  So  I checked the documentation and it says   Changed in version 3 6  Accepts a path-like object   path-like object   An object representing a file system path  A path-like object is either a str or     I did a little more digging and the following also works  with open  quot    FutureBookList file txt quot   as file     data   file read

[python] Reading file using relative path in python project

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