`ReadDir`

Consider a directory (a folder). It contains many files—we often we want a list of these files. In the Go language, we must combine 2 methods to get a list of all the files.

With the os package, we have access to many file system functions. We first need os.Open. We can use ReadDir (which is faster) or Readdir (the older method).

Example

To begin, we make sure to import the "os" package. We then invoke os.Open on the target directory (the one we want to get all the files from).

Start We call ReadDir. The argument 0 is acceptable—this means all files are returned.

Next We use a for-range loop to iterate over all the files. We call the Name() func to get each file's name.

Finally We can get the full path for each file by using the directory we are reading from, and prepending that to the file's name.

package main

import (
    "fmt"
    "os"
)

func main() {

    // Directory we want to get all files from.
    directory := "/Users/sam/";

    // Open the directory.
    outputDirRead, _ := os.Open(directory)

    // Call ReadDir to get all files.
    outputDirFiles, _ := outputDirRead.ReadDir(0)

    // Loop over files.
    for outputIndex := range(outputDirFiles) {
        outputFileHere := outputDirFiles[outputIndex]

        // Get name of file.
        outputNameHere := outputFileHere.Name()

        // Print name.
        fmt.Println(outputNameHere)
    }
}...
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`Readdir`, `ReadDir`

New releases of Go have the ReadDir (capitalized Dir) method. This is implemented in a different way—it returns fs.DirEntry, not fs.FileInfo.

And The ReadDir method is much faster than Readdir. For a folder with over a thousand files, this can save 4 milliseconds.

Info We see 2 Go programs: a version that uses Readdir, and one that uses ReadDir. The timings come after the 2 programs.

Note By changing Readdir to ReadDir, the result value changes and some code may need updating if the result is stored anywhere.

However This simple change, just 1 letter, can have big impacts on real-world programs. ReadDir should always be preferred.

package main

import (
    "fmt"
    "os"
    "time"
)

func main() {
    directory := "/Users/sam/perls/t/"
    outputDirRead, _ := os.Open(directory)
    t0 := time.Now()
    outputDirFiles, _ := outputDirRead.Readdir(0)
    t1 := time.Now()
    fmt.Println("Time:", t1.Sub(t0), len(outputDirFiles))
}
package main

import (
    "fmt"
    "os"
    "time"
)

func main() {
    directory := "/Users/sam/perls/t/"
    outputDirRead, _ := os.Open(directory)
    t0 := time.Now()
    outputDirFiles, _ := outputDirRead.ReadDir(0)
    t1 := time.Now()
    fmt.Println("Time:", t1.Sub(t0), len(outputDirFiles))
}Time: 5.764292ms 1607 (Readdir)
Time: 1.143333ms 1607 (ReadDir)

Notes, Linux

This method works on Linux (as the output reveals). But with Windows-style paths, it can also work on a Windows system. The paths are system-dependent.

The os package in Go is powerful, and has methods that can act upon the file system. Often (as with this example) we must combine 2 or more methods.

ReadDir

Example

Readdir, ReadDir

Notes, Linux

`ReadDir`

`Readdir`, `ReadDir`