files                  package:base                  R Documentation

File and Directory Manipulation

Description:

     These functions provide a low-level interface to the computer's
     file system.

Usage:

     file.create(..., showWarnings = TRUE)
     file.exists(...)
     file.remove(...)
     file.rename(from, to)
     file.append(file1, file2)
     file.copy(from, to, overwrite = FALSE)
     file.symlink(from, to)
     dir.create(path, showWarnings = TRUE, recursive = FALSE,
                mode = "0777")
     Sys.chmod(paths, mode = "0777")
     Sys.umask(mode = "0000")

Arguments:

..., file1, file2, from, to, paths: character vectors, containing file
          names or paths.

    path: a character vector containing a single path name.

overwrite: logical; should the destination files be overwritten?

showWarnings: logical; should the warnings on failure be shown?

recursive: logical: should elements of the path other than the last be
          created?  If true, like Unix's 'mkdir -p'.

    mode: the file mode to be used on Unix-alikes: it will be coerced
          by 'as.octmode'.

Details:

     The '...' arguments are concatenated to form one character string:
     you can specify the files separately or as one vector. All of
     these functions expand path names: see 'path.expand'.

     'file.create' creates files with the given names if they do not
     already exist and truncates them if they do.  They are created
     with the maximal permissions allowed by the 'umask' setting.

     'file.exists' returns a logical vector indicating whether the
     files named by its argument exist.  (Here 'exists' is in the sense
     of the system's 'stat' call: a file will be reported as existing
     only if you have the permissions needed by 'stat'. Existence can
     also be checked by 'file.access', which might use different
     permissions and so obtain a different result. Note that the
     existence of a file does not imply that it is readable: for that
     use 'file.access'.)

     'file.remove' attempts to remove the files named in its argument.
     On most platforms 'file' includes _empty_ directories, symbolic
     links, fifos and sockets.

     'file.rename' attempts to rename a single file.

     'file.append' attempts to append the files named by its second
     argument to those named by its first.  The R subscript recycling
     rule is used to align names given in vectors of different lengths.

     'file.copy' works in a similar way to 'file.append' but with the
     arguments in the natural order for copying.  Copying to existing
     destination files is skipped unless 'overwrite = TRUE'. The 'to'
     argument can specify a single existing directory.

     'file.symlink' makes symbolic links on those Unix-like platforms
     which support them.  The 'to' argument can specify a single
     existing directory.

     'dir.create' creates the last element of the path, unless
     'recursive = TRUE'.  Trailing path separators are removed. The
     mode will be modified by the 'umask' setting in the same way as
     for the system function 'mkdir'.  What modes can be set is
     OS-dependent, and it is unsafe to assume that more than three
     octal digits will be used.  For more details see your OS's
     documentation on the system call 'mkdir' (and not that on the
     command-line utility of that name). 

     'Sys.chmod' sets the file permissions of one or more files. It may
     not be supported (when a warning is issued). See the comments for
     'dir.create' for how modes are interpreted. Changing mode on a
     symbolic link is unlikely to work (nor be necessary).  For more
     details see your OS's documentation on the system call 'chmod'
     (and not that on the command-line utility of that name). 

     'Sys.umask' sets the 'umask'. It may not be supported (when a
     warning is issued and '"0000"' returned).  For more details see
     your OS's documentation on the system call 'umask'.

Value:

     'dir.create' and 'file.rename' return a logical, true for success.

     'Sys.umask' returns the previous value of the 'umask', invisibly,
     as a length-one object of class '"octmode"'.

     The remaining functions return a logical vector indicating which
     operation succeeded for each of the files attempted.

     'dir.create' will return failure if the directory already exists.

     If 'showWarnings = TRUE', 'file.create' and 'dir.create' will give
     a warning for an unexpected failure (e.g. not for a missing value
     nor for an already existing component for 'dir.create(recursive =
     TRUE)').

     Using a missing value for a file or path name will always be
     regarded as a failure.

Author(s):

     Ross Ihaka, Brian Ripley

See Also:

     'file.info', 'file.access', 'file.path', 'file.show',
     'list.files', 'unlink', 'basename', 'path.expand'.

     'file_test'.

Examples:

     cat("file A\n", file="A")
     cat("file B\n", file="B")
     file.append("A", "B")
     file.create("A")
     file.append("A", rep("B", 10))
     if(interactive()) file.show("A")
     file.copy("A", "C")
     dir.create("tmp")
     file.copy(c("A", "B"), "tmp")
     list.files("tmp")
     setwd("tmp")
     file.remove("B")
     file.symlink(file.path("..", c("A", "B")), ".")
     setwd("..")
     unlink("tmp", recursive=TRUE)
     file.remove("A", "B", "C")

