# Looking for a file somewhere in a directory recursively **URL:** \ **Category:** Ruby\ **Created:** [August 23, 2010, 4:50pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/looking-for-a-file-somewhere-in-a-directory-recursively/193730 "2010-08-23T16:50:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![ralphshnelvar](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/r/e19adc/32.png) [@ralphshnelvar](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/ralphshnelvar)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2010, 4:50pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/looking-for-a-file-somewhere-in-a-directory-recursively/193730/1 "2010-08-23T16:50:03Z")
Assume I have a file pattern temp\*.bat Assume I have a directory d:\XXX and that I want to find all instances using Windows’ file matching mechanisms rather than than Ruby regular expressions or the functionality of fnmatch. In other words … it _has_ to be the Windows file matching method exactly. I see that FileUtils has a bunch of functionality but what I want is something like X\_FileUtils.dir(“MyDir”).pattern("\*.bat") { |file| puts file } Is there a gem “out there” to do what I want? Ralph ---
**Author:** ![ralphshnelvar](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/r/e19adc/32.png) [@ralphshnelvar](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/ralphshnelvar)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2010, 5:04pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/looking-for-a-file-somewhere-in-a-directory-recursively/193730/2 "2010-08-23T17:04:41Z")
What about doing something like this: result = %x[dir \*.bat] …and doing some basic parsing on the results? ---
**Author:** ![ralphshnelvar](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/r/e19adc/32.png) [@ralphshnelvar](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/ralphshnelvar)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2010, 5:29pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/looking-for-a-file-somewhere-in-a-directory-recursively/193730/3 "2010-08-23T17:29:17Z")
2010/8/23 Ralph S. [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid): > Assume I have a file pattern > temp\*.bat > > Assume I have a directory d:\XXX > > and that I want to find all instances using Windows’ file matching mechanisms rather than than Ruby regular expressions or the functionality of fnmatch. > > In other words … it _has_ to be the Windows file matching method exactly. What exactly do you mean by “Windows file matching method”? Windows uses globbing very similar to most Unix shells. So as long as you stick with using “\*” and “?” you can just use Dir.glob or Dir.[]. > I see that FileUtils has a bunch of functionality but what I want is something like > > X\_FileUtils.dir(“MyDir”).pattern(“\*.bat”) { |file| puts file } > > Is there a gem “out there” to do what I want? For the pattern above you only need batches = Dir[‘MyDir/\*.bat’] or if you want to get fancy: batches = Dir[File.join(‘MyDir’, ‘\*.bat’)] For the fully recursive version you can do batches = Dir[‘MyDir/\*\*/\*.bat’] and be done. No Gems required. You can even do batches = Dir[‘MyDir/\*\*/\*.{bat,cmd}’] and really get all Windows batch files. Kind regards robert ---
**Author:** ![ralphshnelvar](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/r/e19adc/32.png) [@ralphshnelvar](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/ralphshnelvar)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2010, 7:19pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/looking-for-a-file-somewhere-in-a-directory-recursively/193730/4 "2010-08-23T19:19:23Z")
On Aug 23, 2010, at 11:47 AM, Ralph S. wrote: > RK\> and be done. No Gems required. You can even do > RK\> batches = Dir[‘MyDir/\*\*/\*.{bat,cmd}’] > RK\> and really get all Windows batch files. > > Is the stuff, above, some sort of 1.9 syntax? Do you really mean > square brackets? > > On 1.8 … I cannot get anything you wrote, about, to work. Different Rob(ert), but yes, there is a [] method defined on Dir There’s no reason to think that it wouldn’t work on your Windows system. Mine is a Mac, but the ruby code is the same: irb\> RUBY\_VERSION =\> “1.8.6” irb\> Dir[‘_.rb’] =\> [“listdiff.rb”] irb\> Dir['code/ruby/mailing\_list/\*\*/_.rb’] =\> [“code/ruby/mailing\_list/assoc.rb”, “code/ruby/mailing\_list/ merge\_csv.rb”, “code/ruby/mailing\_list/sales\_data\_graph.rb”, “code/ ruby/mailing\_list/simulating\_vehicles.rb”, “code/ruby/mailing\_list/ sorting\_with\_numbers.rb”] Note that _I_ have a code/ruby/mailing\_list/ directory, but you’d have to use directory names that exist on your system. -Rob Rob B. removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid [http://AgileConsultingLLC.com/](http://AgileConsultingLLC.com/) removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid [http://GaslightSoftware.com/](http://GaslightSoftware.com/) ---
**Author:** ![ralphshnelvar](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/r/e19adc/32.png) [@ralphshnelvar](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/ralphshnelvar)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2010, 5:48pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/looking-for-a-file-somewhere-in-a-directory-recursively/193730/5 "2010-08-23T17:48:37Z")
Robert, Monday, August 23, 2010, 9:25:56 AM, you wrote: RK\> For the pattern above you only need RK\> batches = Dir[‘MyDir/\*.bat’] RK\> or if you want to get fancy: RK\> batches = Dir[File.join(‘MyDir’, ‘\*.bat’)] RK\> For the fully recursive version you can do RK\> batches = Dir[‘MyDir/\*\*/\*.bat’] RK\> and be done. No Gems required. You can even do RK\> batches = Dir[‘MyDir/\*\*/\*.{bat,cmd}’] RK\> and really get all Windows batch files. Is the stuff, above, some sort of 1.9 syntax? Do you really mean square brackets? On 1.8 … I cannot get anything you wrote, about, to work. ---
**Author:** ![ralphshnelvar](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/r/e19adc/32.png) [@ralphshnelvar](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/ralphshnelvar)\ **Post date:** [August 24, 2010, 9:13am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/looking-for-a-file-somewhere-in-a-directory-recursively/193730/6 "2010-08-24T09:13:40Z")
2010/8/23 Ralph S. [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid): > RK\> batches = Dir[File.join(‘MyDir’, ‘\*.bat’)] > > Is the stuff, above, some sort of 1.9 syntax? Do you really mean square brackets? No. Yes. > On 1.8 … I cannot get anything you wrote, about, to work. Please show your IRB session / code and the errors you got. Kind regards robert