DIRs v. FILEs

[Walt Decker]

What is "Z:\SOMEPATH\SOMEFILE\MYFILES"; directory or file?
What is "Z:\SOMEPATH\SOMEFILE\MYFILES.FIL"; directory or file?

That depends on how it is created. Windows(tm) does not care.

Z = MKDIR("Z:\SOMEPATH\SOMEFILE\MYFILES") creates a directory if it has not been created and if it is not a file.
Z = MKDIR("Z:\SOMEPATH\SOMEFILE\MYFILES.FIL") creates a directory if it has not been created and if it is not a file.

OPEN "Z:\SOMEPATH\SOMEFILE\MYFILES" FOR RANDOM AS #FO creates a file if it is not a directory.
OPEN "Z:\SOMEPATH\SOMEFILE\MYFILES.FIL" FOR RANDOM AS #FO creates a file if it is not a directory.

Liberty Basic does not provide a good way to determine if a given path is a directory or a file. If one wants to determine if the file "Z:\SOMEPATH\SOMEFILE\MYFILES" exists, LB's FILES() function will not find it; it is treated as a directoy instead of a file. What you can do is search "Z:\SOMEPATH\SOMEFILE" with the wild-card "*.*" then parse through the array looking for "MYFILES".

On the other hand, if one is not adverse to using CALLDLL one can query FN_Dir.dll functions FN_DirExists() and FN_FileExists().

FN_Dir.dll can be found HERE

[Brandon Parker]

Is there something terribly difficult or wrong with this approach? This uses the built-in LB "FILES" command which is very powerful when you understand how it works and what it returns.

Global False : False = 0
Global True : True = 1

Dim Info$(0, 0)

'  "Basic Languages exists as both a folder and a text file in my D:\ directory.
'  The functions below return the following which is completed expected"
'   - 0
'   - 1
'   - 1
'   - 0
'   - 1

'This does not find the file
Print fileExists("D:\", "Basic Languages")
'This finds the file
Print fileExists("D:\", "Basic Languages.txt")
'This finds the file
Print fileExists("D:\", "Basic Languages*")

'This does not find the folder
Print searchForFolder("D:\", "Basic Languages.txt")
'This finds the folder
Print searchForFolder("D:\", "Basic Languages")
End

'_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
'_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

   Function fileExists(path$, filename$)
       Files path$, filename$, Info$()
       fileExists = Val(Info$(0, 0))
       ReDim Info$(0, 0)
   End Function

'_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
'_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

   Function searchForFolder(directory$, folder$)
       On Error GoTo [Error]
           directory$ = directory$ + "\"
           Files directory$, "*", Info$()
           If Val(Info$(0,1)) > 0 Then
               For i = 1 To Val(Info$(0,1))
                   If Lower$(Info$(Val(Info$(0,0)) + i, 1)) = Lower$(folder$) Then
                       searchForFolder = True
                       Exit For
                   End If
               Next i
           End If
           ReDim Info$(0, 0)
       [Error]
   End Function


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Brandon Parker

[Walt Decker]

Is there something terribly difficult or wrong with this approach?

No, other than it is cludgy. There are better ways.

[Brandon Parker]

Personally, I would disagree. Using two functions built with native LB code doing the exact thing the "Files" command was designed to do seems much better than handing it off to a DLL which is only using the exact same underlying system that LB is using in the end. That is my opinion though...


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Brandon Parker

[Walt Decker]

I was referring to FindFirstFile() and FindNextFile().