Importing files from different folder

Question

I have the following folder structure  application  -- app         -- folder             -- file py  -- app2      -- some folder          -- some file py  I want to import some functions from file py in some file py  I ve tried from application app folder file import func name  and some other various attempts but so far I couldn t manage to import properly  How can I do this

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So I had just right clicked on my IDE  and added a new folder and was wondering why I wasn t able to import from it  Later I realized I have to right click and create a Python Package  and not a classic file system folder  Or a post-mortem method being adding an   init   py  which makes python treat the file system folder as a package  as mentioned in other answers  Adding this answer here just in case someone went this route

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If the purpose of loading a module from a specific path is to assist you during the development of a custom module  you can create a symbolic link in the same folder of the test script that points to the root of the custom module  This module reference will take precedence over any other modules installed of the same name for any script run in that folder   I tested this on Linux but it should work in any modern OS that supports symbolic links   One advantage to this approach is that you can you can point to a module that s sitting in your own local SVC branch working copy which can greatly simplify the development cycle time and reduce failure modes of managing different versions of the module

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In case anyone still looking for a solution  This worked for me  Python adds the folder containing the script you launch to the PYTHONPATH  so if you run python application app2 some folder some file py  Only the folder application app2 some folder is added to the path  not the base dir that you re executing the command in   Instead  run your file as a module and add a   init   py in your some folder directory  python -m application app2 some folder some file  This will add the base dir to the python path  and then classes will be accessible via a non-relative import

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The code below imports the Python script given by it s path  no matter where it is located  in a Python version-save way  def import module by path path       name   os path splitext os path basename path   0      if sys version info 0     2               Python 2         import imp         return imp load source name  path      elif sys version info  2   lt    3  4               Python 3  version  lt   3 4         from importlib machinery import SourceFileLoader         return SourceFileLoader name  path  load module       else                                        Python 3  after 3 4         import importlib util         spec   importlib util spec from file location name  path          mod   importlib util module from spec spec          spec loader exec module mod          return mod  This code is not written by me  I found it in the codebase of psutils  in psutils test   init   py  line 1042  permalink to most recent commit as of 09 10 2020   Usage example  script    quot  home username Documents some script py quot  some module   import module by path script  print some module foo     Caveat  The module will be treated as top-level  If it s a submodule of some bigger project  then relative imports from parent packages will fail

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From what I know   add an   init   py file directly in the folder of the functions you want  to  import  will do  the job

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I usually create a symlink to the module I want to import  The symlink makes sure Python interpreter can locate the module inside the current directory  the script you are importing the other module into   later on when your work is over  you can remove the symlink  Also  you should ignore symlinks in  gitignore  so that  you wouldn t accidentally commit symlinked modules to your repo  This approach lets you even successfully work with modules that are located parallel to the script you are executing  ln -s   path to original module my module   symlink inside the destination directory my module

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I think an ad-hoc way would be to use the environment variable PYTHONPATH as described in the documentation  Python2  Python3    Linux  amp  OSX export PYTHONPATH  HOME dirWithScripts   PYTHONPATH    Windows set PYTHONPATH C  path to dirWithScripts   PYTHONPATH

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Considering application as the root directory for your python project  create an empty   init   py file in application  app and folder folders  Then in your some file py make changes as follows to get the definition of func name   import sys sys path insert 0  r  from root directory application    from application app folder file import func name    You can also use     wildcard to import all the functions in file py file  func name

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I was faced with the same challenge  especially when importing multiple files  this is how I managed to overcome it   import os  sys  from os path import dirname  join  abspath sys path insert 0  abspath join dirname   file              from root folder import file name

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Note  This answer was intended for a very specific question  For most programmers coming here from a search engine  this is not the answer you are looking for  Typically you would structure your files into packages  see other answers  instead of modifying the search path   By default  you can t  When importing a file  Python only searches the directory that the entry-point script is running from and sys path which includes locations such as the package installation directory  it s actually a little more complex than this  but this covers most cases   However  you can add to the Python path at runtime    some file py import sys   insert at 1  0 is the script path  or    in REPL  sys path insert 1    path to application app folder    import file

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The answers here are lacking in clarity  this is tested on Python 3 6  With this folder structure   main py   ---- myfolder myfile py   Where myfile py has the content   def myfunc        print  hello     The import statement in main py is   from myfolder myfile import myfunc myfunc     and this will print hello

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Instead of just doing an import      do this    from  lt MySubFolder gt  import  lt MyFile gt   MyFile is inside the MySubFolder

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I bumped into the same question several times  so I would like to share my solution   Python Version  3 X  The following solution is for someone who develops your application in Python version 3 X because Python 2 is not supported since Jan 1 2020   Project Structure  In python 3  you don t need   init   py in your project subdirectory due to the Implicit Namespace Packages  See Is init py not required for packages in Python 3 3     Project   -- main py  --  gitignore    -- a      -- file a py    -- b      -- file b py   Problem Statement  In file b py  I would like to import a class A in file a py under the folder a   Solutions   1 A quick but dirty way  Without installing the package like you are currently developing a new project  Using the try catch to check if the errors  Code example    import sys try        The insertion index should be 1 because index 0 is this file     sys path insert 1    absolute path to folder a      the type of path is string       because the system path already have the absolute path to folder a       so it can recognize file a py while searching      from file a import A except  ModuleNotFoundError  ImportError  as e      print     fileure  format type e    else      print  Import succeeded      2 Install your package  Once you installed your application  in this post  the tutorial of installation is not included   You can simply  try      from   future   import absolute import       now it can reach class A of file a py in folder a        by relative import     from   a file a import A   except  ModuleNotFoundError  ImportError  as e      print     fileure  format type e    else      print  Import succeeded     Happy coding

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The best practice for creating a package can be running and accessing the other modules from a module like main module py at highest level directory  This structure demonstrates you can use and access sub package  parent package  or same level packages and modules by using a top level directory file main module py  Create and run these files and folders for testing   package             -----   init   py  Empty file       ------- main module py  Contains  import subpackage 1 module 1               ------- module 0 py  Contains  print  module 0 at parent directory  is imported                                ------- subpackage 1                                     -----   init   py  Empty file                   ----- module 1 py  Contains  print  importing other modules from module 1                                                    import module 0                                               import subpackage 2 module 2                                               import subpackage 1 sub subpackage 3 module 3                   ----- photo png                                                      ----- sub subpackage 3                                                               -----   init   py  Empty file                                ----- module 3 py  Contains  print  module 3 at sub directory  is imported                ------- subpackage 2                                     -----   init   py  Empty file                   ----- module 2 py  Contains  print  module 2 at same level directory  is imported     Now run main module py the output is  gt  gt  gt  importing other modules from module 1         module 0 at parent directory  is imported      module 2 at same level directory  is imported      module 3 at sub directory  is imported   Opening pictures and files note  In a package structure if you want to access a photo  use absolute directory from highest level directory  let s Suppose you are running main module py and you want to open photo png inside module 1 py  what module 1 py must contain is  Correct  image path    subpackage 1 photo png  cv2 imread image path   Wrong  image path    photo png  cv2 imread image path   although module 1 py and photo png are at same directory

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You can refresh the Python shell by pressing f5  or go to Run-  Run Module  This way you don t have to change the directory to read something from the file  Python will automatically change the directory  But if you want to work with different files from different directory in the Python Shell  then you can change the directory in sys  as Cameron said earlier

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I was working on project a that I wanted users to install via pip install a with the following file list      -- setup py  -- MANIFEST in  -- a      --   init   py      -- a py      -- b          --   init   py          -- b py   setup py  from setuptools import setup  setup     name  a     version  0 0 1     packages   a      package data        a     b               MANIFEST in  recursive-include b       a init py  from   future   import absolute import  from a a import cats import a b   a a py  cats   0   a b init py  from   future   import absolute import  from a b b import dogs   a b b py  dogs   1     I installed the module by running the following from the directory with MANIFEST in   python setup py install   Then  from a totally different location on my filesystem  moustache armwrestle I was able to run   import a dir a    Which confirmed that a cats indeed equalled 0 and a b dogs indeed equalled 1  as intended

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I ve had these problems a number of times  I ve come to this same page a lot   In my last problem I had to run the server from a fixed directory  but whenever debugging I wanted to run from different sub-directories    import sys sys insert 1   path     did NOT work for me because at different modules I had to read different   csv files which were all in the same directory   In the end  what worked for me was not pythonic  I guess  but   I used a if   main   on top of the module I wanted to debug  that is run from a different than usual path   So     On top of the module  instead of on the bottom import os if   name         main         os chdir   path for the regularly run directory

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If you have multiple folders and sub folders  you can always import any class or module from the main directory  For example  Tree structure of the project Project   -- main py  --  gitignore    -- src       ----model            -- user model py       ----controller            -- user controller py  Now  if you want to import  quot UserModel quot  class from user model py in main py file  you can do that using  from src model user model py import UserModel  Also  you can import same class in user controller py file using same line  from src model user model py import UserModel  Overall  you can give reference of main project directory to import classes and files in any python file inside Project directory

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This works for me on windows     some file py on mainApp app2  import sys sys path insert 0  sys path 0     app2    import some file

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Try Python s relative imports   from    app folder file import func name   Every leading dot is another higher level in the hierarchy beginning with the current directory     Problems  If this isn t working for you then you probably are getting bit by the many gotcha s relative imports has  Read answers and comments for more details   How to fix  quot Attempted relative import in non-package quot  even with   init   py  Hint  have   init   py at every directory level  You might need python -m application app2 some folder some file  leaving off  py  which you run from the top level directory or have that top level directory in your PYTHONPATH  Phew

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Using sys path append with an absolute path is not ideal when moving the application to other environments  Using a relative path won t always work because the current working directory depends on how the script was invoked  Since the application folder structure is fixed  we can use os path to get the full path of the module we wish to import  For example  if this is the structure   home me application app2 some folder vanilla py  home me application app2 another folder mango py  And let s say that you want to import the mango module  You could do the following in vanilla py  import sys  os path mango dir    os path abspath os path join os path dirname   file                another folder    sys path append mango dir  import mango  Of course  you don t need the mango dir variable  To understand how this works look at this interactive session example   gt  gt  gt  import os  gt  gt  gt  mydir     home me application app2 some folder   gt  gt  gt  newdir   os path abspath os path join mydir          gt  gt  gt  newdir       home me application app2   gt  gt  gt  newdir   os path abspath os path join mydir             another folder   gt  gt  gt    gt  gt  gt  newdir   home me application app2 another folder   gt  gt  gt    And check the os path documentation  Also worth noting that dealing with multiple folders is made easier when using packages  as one can use dotted module names

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Nothing wrong with   from application app folder file import func name   Just make sure folder also contains an   init   py  this allows it to be included as a package  Not sure why the other answers talk about PYTHONPATH

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I m quite special   I use Python with Windows    I just complete information   for both Windows and Linux  both relative and absolute path work into sys path  I need relative paths because I use my scripts on the several PCs and under different main directories      And when using Windows both   and   can be used as separator for file names and of course you must double   into Python strings  some valid examples    sys path append  c   tools  mydir   sys path append      mytools   sys path append  c  tools mydir   sys path append     mytools      note   I think that   is more convenient than    event if it is less  Windows-native  because it is Linux-compatible and simpler to write and copy to Windows explorer

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Just use change dir function from os module  os chdir  quot Here new director quot    than you can import normally More Info

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In my case I had a class to import   My file looked like this      opt path to code log helper py class LogHelper        stuff here   In my main file I included the code via   import sys sys path append   opt path to code    from log helper import LogHelper

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Your problem is that Python is looking in the Python directory for this file and not finding it  You must specify that you are talking about the directory that you are in and not the Python one   To do this you change this   from application app folder file import func name  to this   from  application app folder file import func name   By adding the dot you are saying look in this folder for the application folder instead of looking in the Python directory

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Worked for me in python3 on linux  import sys   sys path append pathToFolderContainingScripts    from scriptName import functionName  scriptName without  py extension

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When modules are in parallel locations  as in the question   application app2 some folder some file py application app2 another folder another file py   This shorthand makes one module visible to the other   import sys sys path append

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You can use importlib to import modules where you want to import a module from a folder using a string like so   import importlib  scriptName    Snake   script   importlib import module  Scripts    s    scriptName    This example has a main py which is the above code then a folder called Scripts and then you can call whatever you need from this folder by changing the scriptName variable  You can then use script to reference to this module  such as if I have a function called Hello   in the Snake module you can run this function by doing so   script Hello     I have tested this in Python 3 6

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First import sys in name-file py   import sys   Second append the folder path in name-file py  sys path insert 0    the folder path name-package      Third Make a blank file called    init    py in your subdirectory  this tells Python it is a package    name-file py name-package      init    py name-module py    Fourth import the module inside the folder in name-file py  from name-package import name-module

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In Python 3 4 and later  you can import from a source file directly  link to documentation   This is not the simplest solution  but I m including this answer for completeness   Here is an example  First  the file to be imported  named foo py   def announce        print  Imported      The code that imports the file above  inspired heavily by the example in the documentation   import importlib util  def module from file module name  file path       spec   importlib util spec from file location module name  file path      module   importlib util module from spec spec      spec loader exec module module      return module  foo   module from file  foo     path to foo py    if   name         main         print foo      print dir foo       foo announce     The output    lt module  foo  from   path to foo py  gt      builtins        cached        doc        file        loader        name        package        spec      announce   Imported    Note that the variable name  the module name  and the filename need not match  This code still works   import importlib util  def module from file module name  file path       spec   importlib util spec from file location module name  file path      module   importlib util module from spec spec      spec loader exec module module      return module  baz   module from file  bar     path to foo py    if   name         main         print baz      print dir baz       baz announce     The output    lt module  bar  from   path to foo py  gt      builtins        cached        doc        file        loader        name        package        spec      announce   Imported    Programmatically importing modules was introduced in Python 3 1 and gives you more control over how modules are imported  Refer to the documentation for more information

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