When a piece of data is read from a file it is copied from the file into the program Python?

In this short guide, you’ll see how to copy a file, from one folder to another, using Python.

To start, here is a template that you may use to copy a file in Python using shutil.copyfile:

import shutil original = r'original path where the file is currently stored\file name.file extension' target = r'target path where the file will be copied\file name.file extension' shutil.copyfile(original, target)

Let’s now see the steps to apply the above template in practice.

Step 1: Capture the original path

To begin, capture the path where your file is currently stored.

For example, let’s suppose that a CSV file is stored in a folder called Test_1:

C:\Users\Ron\Desktop\Test_1\products.csv

Where the CSV file name is ‘products‘ and the file extension is csv.

Step 2: Capture the target path

Next, capture the target path where you’d like to copy the file.

For our example, the file will be copied into a folder called Test_2:

C:\Users\Ron\Desktop\Test_2\products.csv

Step 3: Copy the file in Python using shutil.copyfile

For the final step, use the following template to copy your file:

import shutil original = r'original path where the file is currently stored\file name.file extension' target = r'target path where the file will be copied\file name.file extension' shutil.copyfile(original, target)

Make sure to place the ‘r‘ character before your paths to avoid the following error:

SyntaxError: (unicode error) ‘unicodeescape’ codec can’t decode bytes in position 2-3: truncated \UXXXXXXXX escape

In the context of our example, the complete code would look like this:

import shutil original = r'C:\Users\Ron\Desktop\Test_1\products.csv' target = r'C:\Users\Ron\Desktop\Test_2\products.csv' shutil.copyfile(original, target)

If you run the code in Python (adjusted to your paths), you’ll see that the ‘products‘ CSV file would be copied into the Test_2 folder.

Alternatively, you may copy a file with a new name.

For instance, let’s copy the original CSV file (with the file name of ‘products‘) to the new location with a new file name (‘new_products‘):

import shutil original = r'C:\Users\Ron\Desktop\Test_1\products.csv' target = r'C:\Users\Ron\Desktop\Test_2\new_products.csv' shutil.copyfile(original, target)

The new file name (called ‘new_products‘) would then be copied in the target location (the Test_2 folder).

The same principles would apply for other file types. For instance, let’s suppose that a JPG file called ‘image‘ is stored in the Test_1 folder.

The following code can then be used to copy the image to the Test_2 folder:

import shutil original = r'C:\Users\Ron\Desktop\Test_1\image.jpg' target = r'C:\Users\Ron\Desktop\Test_2\image.jpg' shutil.copyfile(original, target)

The JPG file should now appear in the Test_2 folder.

Understanding how to copy files in Python using shutil library

Photo by Volodymyr Hryshchenko on Unsplash

Introduction

Copying files programmatically, is one of the most common tasks in day-to-day software development. In today’s short guide we will explore a few different ways for copying files in Python using a library called shutil.

The shutil module is part of the Python’s Standard Library and offers a wide range of high level file operations. Now with respect to file copying, the library offers numerous methods that can be used depending on whether you want to copy metadata or file permissions and whether the desired destination will be a directory.

In this article, we will discuss about all available methods for doing so, namely

• shutil.copy
• shutil.copyfile
• shutil.copy2
• shutil.copyfileobj

At the end of the guide you can find a table that summarises the features of each individual methods mentioned above.

shutil.copy

shutil.copy() method is used to copy specified source (without the metadata) to the destination file or directory and it will return the path to the newly created file. The src can either be a path-like object or a string.

shutil.copy(src, dst, *, follow_symlinks=True)

• Preserves file permissions
• Destination can be a directory
• Does not copy metadata
• Does not work with File objects

Example

import shutil# Copy file example.txt into a new file called example_copy.txt
shutil.copy('example.txt', 'example_copy.txt')# Copy file example.txt into directory test/
shutil.copy('example.txt', 'test/')

shutil.copyfile

The shutil.copyfile() method is used to copy the source file (without the metadata) to the specified destination file. Again, the src can either be a path-like object or a string.

shutil.copyfile(src, dst, *, follow_symlinks=True)

• Does not preserve file permissions
• Destination cannot be a directory
• Does not copy metadata
• Does not work with File objects

Example

import shutil# Copy file example.txt into a new file called example_copy.txt
shutil.copyfile('source.txt', 'destination.txt')

shutil.copy2

The shutil.copy2() method is identical to shutil.copy() except that copy2() attempts to preserve file metadata as well.

shutil.copy2(src, dst, *, follow_symlinks=True)

• Preserves file permissions
• Destination can be a directory
• Copies metadata
• Does not work with File objects

Example

import shutil# Copy file example.txt into a new file called example_copy.txt
shutil.copy2('example.txt', 'example_copy.txt')# Copy file example.txt into directory test/
shutil.copy2('example.txt', 'test/')

shutil.copyfileobj

Now if you have to work with File Objects then shutil.copyfileobj is the way to go. Essentially, the method will copy the contents of the source file object to the specified destination file-like object. You can also set the length that corresponds to the buffer size used to copy the contents.

shutil.copyfileobj(fsrc, fdst[, length])

• Does not preserve file permissions
• Destination cannot be a directory
• Does not copy metadata
• Can work with File objects

Example

import shutilsource_file = open('example.txt', 'rb')
dest_file = open('example_copy.txt', 'wb')

shutil.copyfileobj(source_file, dest_file)

Final Thoughts

In today’s short guide we explore a few different ways for programmatically copying files using Python. More precisely, we introduced a few relevant methods offered by shutil module that comes as part of the Standard Library of the language.

Depending on whether you want to copy file permissions, metadata and whether you want to copy a file to a directory (or even use a method which in accepts file objects) you need to choose the one that will do the trick for your specific use-case.

The table below summarises the capabilities of each of the methods discussed in this article. Note that the only method that accepts File Objects is shutil.copyfileobj.

+--------------------+----------------+--------------+-------------+
| Method | Preserves File | Destination | Copies |
| | Permissions | can be a dir | Metadata |
+--------------------+----------------+--------------+-------------+
| shutil.copy | ✔ | ✔ | ✗ |
| shutil.copyfile | ✗ | ✗ | ✗ |
| shutil.copy2 | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
| shutil.copyfileobj | ✗ | ✗ | ✗ |
+--------------------+----------------+--------------+-------------+

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