Generate temporary Directory with files in Python for unittesting

Question

I want to create a temporary folder with a directory and some files:

import os
import tempfile
from pathlib import Path

with tempfile.TemporaryDirectory() as tmp_dir:
    # generate some random files in it
    Path('file.txt').touch()
    Path('file2.txt').touch()

    files_in_dir = os.listdir(tmp_dir)
    print(files_in_dir)


Expected: [file.txt,file2.txt]
Result: []

Does anyone know how to this in Python? Or is there a better way to just do some mocking?

you're touching those files in your current working directory, you probably want `Path(tmp_dir).joinpath('file.txt').touch()` — anthony sottile, Dec 10 '21 at 01:34

score 2 · Accepted Answer · answered Dec 10 '21 at 06:08

You have to create the file inside the directory by getting the path of your tmp_dir. The with context does not do that for you.

with tempfile.TemporaryDirectory() as tmp_dir:
    Path(tmp_dir, 'file.txt').touch()
    Path(tmp_dir, 'file2.txt').touch()
    files_in_dir = os.listdir(tmp_dir)
    print(files_in_dir)

# ['file2.txt', 'file.txt']

Generate temporary Directory with files in Python for unittesting

1 Answers1