whitespaces in the path of windows filepath

Question

I am working on file operations using python.

I have a filepath as :

filepath = "E:/ABC/SEM 2/testfiles/all.txt"

when I am opening the file using python, it says me :

IOError: No such file:

but, the file is present on the drive.
It may be because windows cannnot take "SEM 2" properly as it contains space.
How can I deal with such whitespaces in the path of window path?

How are you opening the file? There should be no problem with the space in the name. — John La Rooy, Feb 13 '13 at 11:11
It's not difficult to tell if the problem is the space (but I don't think so): just rename the directory and see if it can find the file — Raffaele, Feb 13 '13 at 11:11
it is opening the file properly if i select any of the file which doesnt contains such spaces in folder name — sam, Feb 13 '13 at 11:12
Have you tried using forward slashes instead of the basckslash? — Frankline, Feb 13 '13 at 11:12
@Raffaele : yes renaming the directory works but in practical case, my program will not able to rename directories which having spaces — sam, Feb 13 '13 at 11:13
@Frankline actually in the code posted there are only forward slashes... — Raffaele, Feb 13 '13 at 11:13
@Frankline : no i didnt tried it. i guess windows have this problem of slashes and whitespaces always while programming :( — sam, Feb 13 '13 at 11:14
Forward slashes work fine. so do spaces. How are you trying to open the file? — John La Rooy, Feb 13 '13 at 11:16
What if you wrap the path in another pair of quotes? That should work. — Frankline, Feb 13 '13 at 11:17

score 70 · Answer 1 · answered Sep 03 '14 at 17:19

70

path = r"C:\Users\mememe\Google Drive\Programs\Python\file.csv"

Closing the path in r"string" also solved this problem very well.

answered Sep 03 '14 at 17:19

billmanH

1,298
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7

Not for me, I use windows 7 + anaconda 3.5 – FabioSpaghetti Sep 23 '19 at 09:49
What will happen if I used single quotes(') instead of double(")? will that work – Indrajeet Gour Mar 03 '21 at 13:29
what if the string is a variable? – HAL9000 Aug 23 '22 at 16:54

score 21 · Answer 2 · answered Feb 13 '13 at 11:17

21

Try putting double quotes in your filepath variable

"\"E:/ABC/SEM 2/testfiles/all.txt\""

Check the permissions of the file or in any case consider renaming the folder to remove the space

answered Feb 13 '13 at 11:17

valentinos

428
2
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As gnibbler demonstrated, it isn't the space, and more quotes won't help. – msw Feb 13 '13 at 11:29

score 21 · Accepted Answer · answered Feb 13 '13 at 11:23

There is no problem with whitespaces in the path since you're not using the "shell" to open the file. Here is a session from the windows console to prove the point. You're doing something else wrong

Python 2.7.2 (default, Jun 12 2011, 14:24:46) [MSC v.1500 64 bit (AMD64)] on wi
32
Type "help", "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> import os
>>>
>>> os.makedirs("C:/ABC/SEM 2/testfiles")
>>> open("C:/ABC/SEM 2/testfiles/all.txt","w")
<open file 'C:/ABC/SEM 2/testfiles/all.txt', mode 'w' at 0x0000000001D95420>
>>> exit()

C:\Users\Gnibbler>dir "C:\ABC\SEM 2\testfiles"
 Volume in drive C has no label.
 Volume Serial Number is 46A0-BB64

 Directory of c:\ABC\SEM 2\testfiles

13/02/2013  10:20 PM    <DIR>          .
13/02/2013  10:20 PM    <DIR>          ..
13/02/2013  10:20 PM                 0 all.txt
               1 File(s)              0 bytes
               2 Dir(s)  78,929,309,696 bytes free

C:\Users\Gnibbler>

score 4 · Answer 4 · answered Apr 13 '21 at 04:21

4

a hack on Mac:

path = '/Volumes/Public/ABY/Documents/Musiq/slumdog millonaire/Mausam and Escape.mp3'
nPath = path.replace(' ', '\\ ')
print(nPath)

Output:

/Volumes/Public/ABY/Documents/Musiq/slumdog\ millonaire/Mausam\ and\ Escape.mp3

answered Apr 13 '21 at 04:21

Vettiyanakan

7,957
6
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Simple and easy solution, works perfectly on windows as well – pupspulver Oct 20 '21 at 14:06

santarosajoe · Answer 5 · 2020-11-22T04:32:22.310

(WINDOWS - AWS solution)
Solved for windows by putting tripple quotes around files and paths.
Benefits:
1) Prevents excludes that quietly were getting ignored.
2) Files/folders with spaces in them, will no longer kick errors.

    aws_command = 'aws s3 sync """D:/""" """s3://mybucket/my folder/"  --exclude """*RECYCLE.BIN/*""" --exclude """*.cab""" --exclude """System Volume Information/*""" '

    r = subprocess.run(f"powershell.exe {aws_command}", shell=True, capture_output=True, text=True)

score 1 · Answer 6 · answered Dec 08 '22 at 16:26

1

I found a simple hack try adding a single quote before the the double quotes like :

os.system(r'"C:\Program Files\Google\Chrome\Application\chrome.exe"')

worked for me

answered Dec 08 '22 at 16:26

For Cc

15
6

score 0 · Answer 7 · edited Jul 13 '22 at 14:57

0

double back slash \\ will solve the problem

subprocess.run('type "C:\\Users\\nameofuser\\blackdrive - somecorp\\Desktop\\seadlines_data.txt"',shell=True)

edited Jul 13 '22 at 14:57

Z4-tier

7,287
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answered Jul 12 '22 at 09:18

שי אלבז

21
1

score 0 · Answer 8 · edited Feb 21 '23 at 10:02

0

You can use triple quotation marks """ as such:

filepath = """E:/ABC/SEM 2/testfiles/all.txt"""

edited Feb 21 '23 at 10:02

Adriaan

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answered Feb 21 '23 at 09:58

Nguyen Tuan

1
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Please read [answer] and [edit] your answer to contain an explanation as to why this code would actually solve the problem at hand. Always remember that you're not only solving the problem, but are also educating the OP and any future readers of this post. – Adriaan Feb 21 '23 at 10:00

score 0 · Answer 9 · edited Aug 30 '23 at 16:12

0

It works for me

import os

Set working directory

os.chdir("""C:/Users/admin/nht1/OneDrive - quarrycubicle/Desktop/Docs/AI Data Analysis/Tai lieu tham khao""")

os.getcwd()

Out[1]: 'C:\Users\admin\nht1\OneDrive - quarrycubicle\Desktop\Docs\AI Data Analysis\Tai lieu tham khao'

edited Aug 30 '23 at 16:12

TylerH

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answered Jun 17 '23 at 09:24

NG. Hai Tuan

21
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whitespaces in the path of windows filepath

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