Rewrite files from one folder an other and rename them

Question

A short question. I have multiple files in a tester folder on my desktop. Now I want to rewrite all those files, add 'moved' at the end of their filename and move them to a new folder named tester1 also on my desktop. Someone any idea? Thank you in advance. This is my current code:

source = r'c:\data\AS\Desktop\tester'

#Take the absolute filepaths from all the files in tester and open them.
for file in os.listdir(source):
    file_paths = os.path.join(source, file)
    with open(file_paths, 'r') as rf:
        print(rf.read() + '\n')

Does this answer your question? [How to move a file?](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/8858008/how-to-move-a-file) — Moosa Saadat, May 28 '20 at 07:35
Instead of reading the file and then writing the contents to a new file just do normal file copy/rename operation: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/123198/how-do-i-copy-a-file-in-python — NewPythonUser, May 28 '20 at 07:37
You want to **rewrite** files or just **move** them to a new location with a modified name? — Moosa Saadat, May 28 '20 at 07:42

Sherin Jayanand · Answer 1 · 2020-05-28T08:27:02.103

0

Here is something you can use:-

import os
SourceFile="C:/Myfolder/Source/MyFile.txt"
TargetFile="C:/MyFolder/Target/MyFile_moved.txt"
os.rename(SourceFile,TargetFile)

Hope helps.

edited May 28 '20 at 08:27

answered May 28 '20 at 07:54

Sherin Jayanand

204
2
9

I get t the following error: [WinError 2] The system cannot find the file specified: – ManCity10 May 28 '20 at 08:17
I have updated the code to give you the full example so that you can try it. The error you got might be because of the path or non-existence of the file (most probably the path). You could be using "\" instead of "/". Please check that once as well. – Sherin Jayanand May 28 '20 at 08:28
Thank you anyway, but I have used the answer above which makes it possible for multiple files. – ManCity10 May 28 '20 at 11:38
No issues. Happy to hear that you found a solution that worked for you. – Sherin Jayanand May 28 '20 at 12:12

Shreyansh · Accepted Answer · 2020-05-28T08:17:02.123

0

The below code will work if you have extensions in your file and you want 'moved' to be added before extension:

    import os
    import shutil

    src_path = "c:/data/AS/Desktop/tester/"
    dest_path = "c:/data/AS/Desktop/tester1/"

    for file in os.listdir(src_path):
        file_name, extension = file.split(".")
        shutil.move(src_path + file, dest_path + file_name + "moved." + extension)

If you don't have extensions in your files, then the code can be changed as below:

    import os
    import shutil

    src_path = "c:/data/AS/Desktop/tester/"
    dest_path = "c:/data/AS/Desktop/tester1/"

    for file_name in os.listdir(src_path):
        shutil.move(src_path + file_name, dest_path + file_name + "moved")

I have checked this in MacOS, let me know in the comments if you face any issue in Windows.

edited May 28 '20 at 08:17

answered May 28 '20 at 08:05

Shreyansh

458
4
11

I used your second block of code, it seems very logical but I get the following error: [Errno 2] No such file or directory: – ManCity10 May 28 '20 at 08:15
can you check now, I just fixed the issue with path. – Shreyansh May 28 '20 at 08:19
Now that worked, thank you very much! But what did you actually change or do to make it work? – ManCity10 May 28 '20 at 08:31
I replaced the backward slash to forward slash and also added one more slash in end of the path. – Shreyansh May 28 '20 at 08:37
Why did you chose to change those slashles? Wasnt it possible to make use of the 'r' before the pathname? – ManCity10 May 28 '20 at 09:01
Yes, you can use `r''` as it converts it to raw string, but I actually tested it on Mac, and in Mac the paths are of forward slash so raw string won't work. – Shreyansh May 28 '20 at 09:07

Rewrite files from one folder an other and rename them

2 Answers2