PHP File handling Getting file information
Example
Check if a path is a directory or a file
The is_dir function returns whether the argument is a directory, while is_file returns whether the argument is a file. Use file_exists to check if it is either.
$dir = "/this/is/a/directory";
$file = "/this/is/a/file.txt";
echo is_dir($dir) ? "$dir is a directory" : "$dir is not a directory", PHP_EOL,
is_file($dir) ? "$dir is a file" : "$dir is not a file", PHP_EOL,
file_exists($dir) ? "$dir exists" : "$dir doesn't exist", PHP_EOL,
is_dir($file) ? "$file is a directory" : "$file is not a directory", PHP_EOL,
is_file($file) ? "$file is a file" : "$file is not a file", PHP_EOL,
file_exists($file) ? "$file exists" : "$file doesn't exist", PHP_EOL;
This gives:
/this/is/a/directory is a directory
/this/is/a/directory is not a file
/this/is/a/directory exists
/this/is/a/file.txt is not a directory
/this/is/a/file.txt is a file
/this/is/a/file.txt exists
Checking file type
Use filetype to check the type of a file, which may be:
fifochardirblocklinkfilesocketunknown
Passing the filename to the filetype directly:
echo filetype("~"); // dir
Note that filetype returns false and triggers an E_WARNING if the file doesn't exist.
Checking readability and writability
Passing the filename to the is_writable and is_readable functions check whether the file is writable or readable respectively.
The functions return false gracefully if the file does not exist.
Checking file access/modify time
Using filemtime and fileatime returns the timestamp of the last modification or access of the file. The return value is a Unix timestamp -- see Working with Dates and Time for details.
echo "File was last modified on " . date("Y-m-d", filemtime("file.txt"));
echo "File was last accessed on " . date("Y-m-d", fileatime("file.txt"));
Get path parts with fileinfo
$fileToAnalyze = ('/var/www/image.png');
$filePathParts = pathinfo($fileToAnalyze);
echo '<pre>';
print_r($filePathParts);
echo '</pre>';
This example will output:
Array
(
[dirname] => /var/www
[basename] => image.png
[extension] => png
[filename] => image
)
Which can be used as:
$filePathParts['dirname']
$filePathParts['basename']
$filePathParts['extension']
$filePathParts['filename']
| Parameter | Details |
|---|---|
| $path | The full path of the file to be parsed |
| $option | One of four available options [PATHINFO_DIRNAME, PATHINFO_BASENAME, PATHINFO_EXTENSION or PATHINFO_FILENAME] |
- If an option (the second parameter) is not passed, an associative array is returned otherwise a string is returned.
- Does not validate that the file exists.
- Simply parses the string into parts. No validation is done on the file (no mime-type checking, etc.)
- The extension is simply the last extension of
$pathThe path for the fileimage.jpg.pngwould be.pngeven if it technically a.jpgfile. A file without an extension will not return an extension element in the array.
