List directory tree structure in python

Question

I know that we can use os walk   to list all sub-directories or all files in a directory  However  I would like to list the full directory tree content   - Subdirectory 1     - file11    - file12    - Sub-sub-directory 11           - file111          - file112 - Subdirectory 2      - file21     - sub-sub-directory 21     - sub-sub-directory 22             - sub-sub-sub-directory 221             - file 2211   How to best achieve this in Python

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On top of dhobbs answer above  https   stackoverflow com a 9728478 624597   here is an extra functionality of storing results to a file  I personally use it to copy and paste to FreeMind to have a nice overview of the structure  therefore I used tabs instead of spaces for indentation    import os  def list files startpath        with open  folder structure txt    w   as f output          for root  dirs  files in os walk startpath               level   root replace startpath      count os sep              indent     t    1    level              output string           format indent  os path basename root               print output string              f output write output string     n               subindent     t    1    level   1              for f in files                  output string          format subindent  f                  print output string                  f output write output string     n    list files

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I came here looking for the same thing and used dhobbs answer for me  As a way of thanking the community  I added some arguments to write to a file  as akshay asked  and made showing files optional so it is not so bit an output  Also made the indentation an optional argument so you can change it  as some like it to be 2 and others prefer 4    Used different loops so the one not showing files doesn t check if it has to on each iteration   Hope it helps someone else as dhobbs answer helped me  Thanks a lot   def showFolderTree path show files False indentation 2 file output False       Shows the content of a folder in a tree structure  path - string - path of the root folder we want to show  show files - boolean -  Whether or not we want to see files listed                          Defaults to False  indentation - int - Indentation we want to use  defaults to 2     file output - string -  Path  including the name  of the file where we want                         to save the tree        tree       if not show files      for root  dirs  files in os walk path           level   root replace path      count os sep          indent       indentation  level          tree append         format indent os path basename root     if show files      for root  dirs  files in os walk path           level   root replace path      count os sep          indent       indentation  level          tree append         format indent os path basename root                for f in files              subindent       indentation    level 1              tree append        format subindent f    if file output      output file   open file output  w       for line in tree          output file write line          output file write   n   else        Default behaviour  print on screen      for line in tree          print line

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For those who are still looking for an answer  Here is a recursive approach to get the paths in a dictionary   import os   def list files startpath       for root  dirs  files in os walk startpath           dir content              for dir in dirs              go inside   os path join startpath  dir              dir content append list files go inside           files lst              for f in files              files lst append f          return   name   root   files   files lst   dirs   dir content

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There is a package  I created  called seedir for doing this and other things with folder tree diagrams   gt  gt  gt  import seedir as sd  gt  gt  gt  sd seedir   path to some path or package   style  emoji     package   -   init   py  - subpackage1      -   init   py     - moduleX py     - moduleY py  - subpackage2      -   init   py     - moduleZ py  - moduleA py  Something similar to the style OP used can be done with   gt  gt  gt  sd seedir   path to folder   style  spaces   indent 4  anystart  -     - package      -   init   py     - subpackage1          -   init   py         - moduleX py         - moduleY py     - subpackage2          -   init   py         - moduleZ py     - moduleA py

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List directory tree structure in Python   We usually prefer to just use GNU tree  but we don t always have tree on every system  and sometimes Python 3 is available  A good answer here could be easily copy-pasted and not make GNU tree a requirement  tree s output looks like this    tree    -- package         --   init   py         --   main   py         -- subpackage                --   init   py                --   main   py                -- module py         -- subpackage2             --   init   py             --   main   py             -- module2 py  -- package2      --   init   py  4 directories  9 files  I created the above directory structure in my home directory under a directory I call pyscratch  I also see other answers here that approach that sort of output  but I think we can do better  with simpler  more modern code and lazily evaluating approaches  Tree in Python To begin with  let s use an example that  uses the Python 3 Path object uses the yield and yield from expressions  that create a generator function  uses recursion for elegant simplicity uses comments and some type annotations for extra clarity  from pathlib import Path    prefix components  space           branch             pointers  tee        --   last       --     def tree dir path  Path  prefix  str           quot  quot  quot A recursive generator  given a directory Path object     will yield a visual tree structure line by line     with each line prefixed by the same characters      quot  quot  quot          contents   list dir path iterdir          contents each get pointers that are  -- with a final  --       pointers    tee     len contents  - 1     last      for pointer  path in zip pointers  contents           yield prefix   pointer   path name         if path is dir      extend the prefix and recurse              extension   branch if pointer    tee else space                i e  space because last   --   above so no more               yield from tree path  prefix prefix extension   and now  for line in tree Path home      pyscratch        print line   prints   -- package       --   init   py       --   main   py       -- subpackage            --   init   py            --   main   py            -- module py       -- subpackage2           --   init   py           --   main   py           -- module2 py  -- package2      --   init   py  We do need to materialize each directory into a list because we need to know how long it is  but afterwards we throw the list away  For deep and broad recursion this should be lazy enough  The above code  with the comments  should be sufficient to fully understand what we re doing here  but feel free to step through it with a debugger to better grock it if you need to  More features Now GNU tree gives us a couple of useful features that I d like to have with this function   prints the subject directory name first  does so automatically  ours does not  prints the count of n directories  m files option to limit recursion  -L level option to limit to just directories  -d  Also  when there is a huge tree  it is useful to limit the iteration  e g  with islice  to avoid locking up your interpreter with text  as at some point the output becomes too verbose to be useful  We can make this arbitrarily high by default - say 1000  So let s remove the previous comments and fill out this functionality  from pathlib import Path from itertools import islice  space           branch           tee        --   last       --    def tree dir path  Path  level  int -1  limit to directories  bool False           length limit  int 1000        quot  quot  quot Given a directory Path object print a visual tree structure quot  quot  quot      dir path   Path dir path    accept string coerceable to Path     files   0     directories   0     def inner dir path  Path  prefix  str     level -1           nonlocal files  directories         if not level               return   0  stop iterating         if limit to directories              contents    d for d in dir path iterdir   if d is dir            else               contents   list dir path iterdir            pointers    tee     len contents  - 1     last          for pointer  path in zip pointers  contents               if path is dir                    yield prefix   pointer   path name                 directories    1                 extension   branch if pointer    tee else space                  yield from inner path  prefix prefix extension  level level-1              elif not limit to directories                  yield prefix   pointer   path name                 files    1     print dir path name      iterator   inner dir path  level level      for line in islice iterator  length limit           print line      if next iterator  None           print f     length limit   length limit   reached  counted        print f  n directories  directories     f    files  files  if files else       And now we can get the same sort of output as tree  tree Path home      pyscratch    prints  pyscratch  -- package       --   init   py       --   main   py       -- subpackage            --   init   py            --   main   py            -- module py       -- subpackage2           --   init   py           --   main   py           -- module2 py  -- package2      --   init   py  4 directories  9 files  And we can restrict to levels  tree Path home      pyscratch   level 2   prints  pyscratch  -- package       --   init   py       --   main   py       -- subpackage       -- subpackage2  -- package2      --   init   py  4 directories  3 files  And we can limit the output to directories  tree Path home      pyscratch   level 2  limit to directories True   prints  pyscratch  -- package       -- subpackage       -- subpackage2  -- package2  4 directories  Retrospective In retrospect  we could have used path glob for matching  We could also perhaps use path rglob for recursive globbing  but that would require a rewrite  We could also use itertools tee instead of materializing a list of directory contents  but that could have negative tradeoffs and would probably make the code even more complex  Comments are welcome

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import os  def fs tree to dict path        file token          for root  dirs  files in os walk path            tree    d  fs tree to dict os path join root  d   for d in dirs          tree update  f  file token for f in files           return tree    note we discontinue iteration trough os walk   If anybody is interested - that recursive function returns nested structure of dictionaries  Keys are file system names  of directories and files   values are either    sub dictionaries for directories strings for files  see file token    The strings designating files are empty in this example  They can also be e g  given file contents or its owner info or privileges or whatever object different than a dict  Unless it s a dictionary it can be easily distinguished from a  directory type  in further operations   Having such a tree in a filesystem     bash    tree  tmp ex  tmp ex  -- d a         -- d a a         -- d a b                -- f1 txt         -- d a c         -- fa txt  -- d b         -- fb1 txt         -- fb2 txt  -- d c   The result will be     python 2 or 3   gt  gt  gt  fs tree to dict   tmp ex          d a              d a a                d a b                  f1 txt                          d a c                fa txt                  d b              fb1 txt                fb2 txt                  d c          If you like that  I ve already created a package  python 2  amp  3  with this stuff  and a nice pyfakefs helper   https   pypi org project fsforge

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Here s a function to do that with formatting   import os  def list files startpath       for root  dirs  files in os walk startpath           level   root replace startpath      count os sep          indent         4    level          print         format indent  os path basename root            subindent         4    level   1          for f in files              print        format subindent  f

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dhobbs s answer is great   but simply change to easy get the level info  def print list dir dir       print       64      print   PRINT LIST DIR   s    dir      print       64      for root  dirs  files in os walk dir           level   root replace dir      count os sep          indent          level         print           format indent  os path basename root            subindent           level   1          for f in files              print        format subindent  f       print       64    and the output like                                                                    PRINT LIST DIR                                                                           os name py   json loads py   linspace python py   list file py   to gson format py   type convert test py   in and replace test py   online log py   padding and clipping py   str tuple py   set test py   script name py   word count py   get14 py   np test2 py                                                                    you can get the level by   count

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You can execute  tree  command of Linux shell   Installation        sudo apt install tree   Using in python        gt  gt  gt  import os      gt  gt  gt  os system  tree  lt desired path gt      Example        gt  gt  gt  os system  tree   Desktop myproject     This gives you a cleaner structure and is visually more comprehensive and easy to type

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A solution without your indentation   for path  dirs  files in os walk given path     print path   for f in files      print f   os walk already does the top-down  depth-first walk you are looking for   Ignoring the dirs list prevents the overlapping you mention

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Based on this fantastic post   http   code activestate com recipes 217212-treepy-graphically-displays-the-directory-structur   Here es a refinement to behave exactly like   http   linux die net man 1 tree      usr bin env python2   - - coding  utf-8 - -    tree py     Written by Doug Dahms     Prints the tree structure for the path specified on the command line  from os import listdir  sep from os path import abspath  basename  isdir from sys import argv  def tree dir  padding  print files False  isLast False  isFirst False       if isFirst          print padding decode  utf8    -1  encode  utf8     dir     else          if isLast              print padding decode  utf8    -1  encode  utf8       --     basename abspath dir           else              print padding decode  utf8    -1  encode  utf8       --     basename abspath dir       files          if print files          files   listdir dir      else          files    x for x in listdir dir  if isdir dir   sep   x       if not isFirst          padding   padding             files   sorted files  key lambda s  s lower        count   0     last   len files  - 1     for i  file in enumerate files           count    1         path   dir   sep   file         isLast   i    last         if isdir path               if count    len files                   if isFirst                      tree path  padding  print files  isLast  False                  else                      tree path  padding        print files  isLast  False              else                  tree path  padding         print files  isLast  False          else              if isLast                  print padding     --     file             else                  print padding     --     file  def usage        return    Usage   s  -f   Print tree structure of path specified  Options  -f      Print files as well as directories PATH    Path to process      basename argv 0    def main        if len argv     1          print usage       elif len argv     2            print just directories         path   argv 1          if isdir path               tree path      False  False  True          else              print  ERROR        path       is not a directory      elif len argv     3 and argv 1      -f             print directories and files         path   argv 2          if isdir path               tree path      True  False  True          else              print  ERROR        path       is not a directory      else          print usage    if   name         main         main

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Maybe faster than  ellockie   Maybe      import os def file writer text       with open  folder structure txt   a   as f output          f output write text  def list files startpath         for root  dirs  files in os walk startpath           level   root replace startpath      count os sep          indent     t    1    level          output string           n  format indent  os path basename root           file writer output string          subindent     t    1    level   1          output string     s  s  n    subindent  f for f in files           file writer    join output string     list files         Test results in screenshot below

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Here you can find code with output like this  https   stackoverflow com a 56622847 6671330  V    - gt  V folder1      - gt  V folder2          - gt  V folder3              - gt  file3 txt          - gt  file2 txt      - gt  V folderX      - gt  file1 txt  - gt  02-hw1 wdwwfm py  - gt  06-t1-home1 py  - gt  06-t1-home2 py  - gt  hw1 py

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Similar to answers above  but for python3  arguably readable and arguably extensible   from pathlib import Path  class DisplayablePath object       display filename prefix middle     --      display filename prefix last     --      display parent prefix middle              display parent prefix last                def   init   self  path  parent path  is last           self path   Path str path           self parent   parent path         self is last   is last         if self parent              self depth   self parent depth   1         else              self depth   0       property     def displayname self           if self path is dir                return self path name               return self path name       classmethod     def make tree cls  root  parent None  is last False  criteria None           root   Path str root           criteria   criteria or cls  default criteria          displayable root   cls root  parent  is last          yield displayable root          children   sorted list path                                for path in root iterdir                                  if criteria path                              key lambda s  str s  lower            count   1         for path in children              is last   count    len children              if path is dir                    yield from cls make tree path                                           parent displayable root                                           is last is last                                           criteria criteria              else                  yield cls path  displayable root  is last              count    1       classmethod     def  default criteria cls  path           return True       property     def displayname self           if self path is dir                return self path name               return self path name      def displayable self           if self parent is None              return self displayname           filename prefix    self display filename prefix last                             if self is last                             else self display filename prefix middle           parts       s    s   format  filename prefix                                      self displayname            parent   self parent         while parent and parent parent is not None              parts append self display parent prefix middle                          if parent is last                          else self display parent prefix last              parent   parent parent          return    join reversed parts     Example usage   paths   DisplayablePath make tree Path  doc    for path in paths      print path displayable      Example output   doc   --  static        -- embedded             -- deep file            -- very                 -- deep                     -- folder                         -- very deep file       -- less deep file  -- about rst  -- conf py  -- index rst   Notes   This uses recursion  It will raise a RecursionError on really deep folder trees The tree is lazily evaluated   It should behave well on really wide folder trees   Immediate children of a given folder are not lazily evaluated  though    Edit    Added bonus  criteria callback for filtering paths

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This solution will only work if you have tree installed on your system   However I m leaving this solution here just in case it helps someone else out   You can tell tree to output the tree structure as XML  tree -X  or JSON  tree -J    JSON of course can be parsed directly with python and XML can easily be read with lxml     With the following directory structure as an example    sri localhost Projects   tree --charset ascii bands bands  -- DreamTroll      -- MattBaldwinson      -- members txt      -- PaulCarter      -- SimonBlakelock      -- Rob Stringer  -- KingsX      -- DougPinnick      -- JerryGaskill      -- members txt      -- TyTabor  -- Megadeth      -- DaveMustaine      -- DavidEllefson      -- DirkVerbeuren      -- KikoLoureiro      -- members txt  -- Nightwish      -- EmppuVuorinen      -- FloorJansen      -- JukkaNevalainen      -- MarcoHietala      -- members txt      -- TroyDonockley      -- TuomasHolopainen  -- Rush      -- AlexLifeson      -- GeddyLee      -- NeilPeart  5 directories  25 files   XML   lt  xml version  1 0  encoding  UTF-8   gt   lt tree gt     lt directory name  bands  gt       lt directory name  DreamTroll  gt         lt file name  MattBaldwinson  gt  lt  file gt         lt file name  members txt  gt  lt  file gt         lt file name  PaulCarter  gt  lt  file gt         lt file name  RobStringer  gt  lt  file gt         lt file name  SimonBlakelock  gt  lt  file gt       lt  directory gt       lt directory name  KingsX  gt         lt file name  DougPinnick  gt  lt  file gt         lt file name  JerryGaskill  gt  lt  file gt         lt file name  members txt  gt  lt  file gt         lt file name  TyTabor  gt  lt  file gt       lt  directory gt       lt directory name  Megadeth  gt         lt file name  DaveMustaine  gt  lt  file gt         lt file name  DavidEllefson  gt  lt  file gt         lt file name  DirkVerbeuren  gt  lt  file gt         lt file name  KikoLoureiro  gt  lt  file gt         lt file name  members txt  gt  lt  file gt       lt  directory gt       lt directory name  Nightwish  gt         lt file name  EmppuVuorinen  gt  lt  file gt         lt file name  FloorJansen  gt  lt  file gt         lt file name  JukkaNevalainen  gt  lt  file gt         lt file name  MarcoHietala  gt  lt  file gt         lt file name  members txt  gt  lt  file gt         lt file name  TroyDonockley  gt  lt  file gt         lt file name  TuomasHolopainen  gt  lt  file gt       lt  directory gt       lt directory name  Rush  gt         lt file name  AlexLifeson  gt  lt  file gt         lt file name  GeddyLee  gt  lt  file gt         lt file name  NeilPeart  gt  lt  file gt       lt  directory gt     lt  directory gt     lt report gt       lt directories gt 5 lt  directories gt       lt files gt 25 lt  files gt     lt  report gt   lt  tree gt    JSON   sri localhost Projects   tree -J bands       type   directory   name   bands   contents          type   directory   name   DreamTroll   contents            type   file   name   MattBaldwinson            type   file   name   members txt            type   file   name   PaulCarter            type   file   name   RobStringer            type   file   name   SimonBlakelock                 type   directory   name   KingsX   contents            type   file   name   DougPinnick            type   file   name   JerryGaskill            type   file   name   members txt            type   file   name   TyTabor                 type   directory   name   Megadeth   contents            type   file   name   DaveMustaine            type   file   name   DavidEllefson            type   file   name   DirkVerbeuren            type   file   name   KikoLoureiro            type   file   name   members txt                 type   directory   name   Nightwish   contents            type   file   name   EmppuVuorinen            type   file   name   FloorJansen            type   file   name   JukkaNevalainen            type   file   name   MarcoHietala            type   file   name   members txt            type   file   name   TroyDonockley            type   file   name   TuomasHolopainen                 type   directory   name   Rush   contents            type   file   name   AlexLifeson            type   file   name   GeddyLee            type   file   name   NeilPeart                    type   report   directories  5  files  25

[python] List directory tree structure in python?

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