Stat function returning an empty list

The_Last_Monk has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

Fellow monks. I am having a problem with the stat function returning an empty list. Basically i have a directory of files that i need to get data from. So the directory is called Language and has a bunch of text files called French.txt, Spanish.txt etc. Here is the code:

opendir(DIR,$dir) or die "dead";
@textfiles = readdir DIR;
foreach(@textfiles){
@data = stat($_);
if(scalar(@data) == 0) { print "Has no items"; }
print "$_\n";
}
[download]

It always prints the "Has no items" and then proceeds to print fhe file name like French.txt and Spanish.txt. Am i doing something wrong? I also tried looping through the data array and printing stuff but it ended up not printing anything

Comment on Stat function returning an empty list Download Code

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Re: Stat function returning an empty list by Paladin (Vicar) on Mar 06, 2015 at 21:08 UTC
readdir doesn't return the path to the file, just the file name. You have a file called "Language/French.txt" but are statting just "French.txt". Change your stat call to: `stat("dir/$_");` [download]	[reply] [d/l]
Re^2: Stat function returning an empty list by The_Last_Monk (Novice) on Mar 06, 2015 at 21:16 UTC
You, Mr.Paladin, are a saviour :)	[reply]
Re: Stat function returning an empty list by Discipulus (Canon) on Mar 06, 2015 at 21:21 UTC
first and always use strict and warnings, and the more powerful debbuging tool i know: print.. as in the following oneliner: `perl -e "opendir my $dir,'.' or die; while ($_ = readdir $dir){@stat = + stat $_; print qq([$_]@stat\n)}"` [download] You must have some problem with $dir, because your posted code, with '.' as value of $dir never print to me "Has no items" HtH L* PS warning if you are on windows stat has some caveats that i dont rememer now.. maybe the module override the built-in or something else There are no rules, there are no thumbs.. Reinvent the wheel, then learn The Wheel; may be one day you reinvent one of THE WHEELS.	[reply] [d/l]
Re: Stat function returning an empty list (path/tiny) by Anonymous Monk on Mar 06, 2015 at 22:04 UTC
use Path::Tiny it readdirs for you so you don't have to trip The_Last_Monk :) it even takes care of dots directories, and even takes regex to filter names `use Path::Tiny qw/ path /; my @textfiles = path( $dir )->children( qr/\.txt$/i );` [download]	[reply] [d/l]
Re^2: Stat function returning an empty list (path/tiny) by Anonymous Monk on Mar 06, 2015 at 23:08 UTC
File::Find has the ability to not visit any subdirectories via `preprocess` option if `follow*` options are false. (Else, all the files would have to be iterated over in a directory only to skip them all.) Does Path::Tiny not have that? While browsing the P::T code I had a smidgen of hope as the (directory) search is hand written, but did not find anything relevant.	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re^3: Stat function returning an empty list (path/tiny) by Anonymous Monk on Mar 07, 2015 at 01:39 UTC
Does Path::Tiny not have that? path()->children is not recursive see Re: How do I ignore an entire directory using File::Find? (find/rule) While browsing the P::T code I had a smidgen of hope as the (directory) search is hand written, but did not find anything relevant. Why? Homework? Here you go, `[href://?node_id=3989;BIT=readdir%20recurs;a=tye]` ?node_id=3989;BIT=readdir%20recurs;a=tye -> Re^2: aborting File::Find::find (gotchas) `[ddg://site:perlmonks.org opendir readdir recursive]` -> Directory Recursion Stop reinventing the wheel! (was Re: Directory Recursion)	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re^4: Stat function returning an empty list (path/tiny) by Anonymous Monk on Mar 07, 2015 at 06:53 UTC
Re^5: Stat function returning an empty list (path/tiny) by Anonymous Monk on Mar 07, 2015 at 08:26 UTC
Re: Stat function returning an empty list by Anonymous Monk on Mar 06, 2015 at 21:41 UTC
I'm a little surprised that the stat docs don't mention this, but the $! variable contains the error. Which in your case would most likely be "No such file or directory". So you could say something like `if(!@data) { warn "stat $_ failed: $!" } else { ... }`	[reply] [d/l]