VLC Media Player LUA Extension fails detecting whether the media file actually exists or not in Windows

Question

As I stated in Q-title, I am trying to utilize an existing VLC extension developed in LUA programming language.

The Lua extension can be referred from here, when I correctly place this extension in %ProgramFiles%\VideoLAN\VLC\lua\extensions path and then open any video/audio file and run it and then when I select View > Remove current file from playlist and disk option, it closes the currently playing media file & throws this error: lua info: [vlc-delete] error: File does not exist.

Not sure but I suspect this is due to Windows quotes issue when FileName and/or FilePath contains spaces in them. And also from the error, it seems that io.popen("if exist " .. file .. " (echo 1)") : read "*l" == "1" isn't reliable for correctly detecting whether file actually exists or not.

I am relatively new to Lua programming, so can anyone assist about any better methods for checking whether file exists or not that works in latest VLC versions like 3.x+(cause I am using VLC 3.0.17.4 64Bit in Windows 10/11 64Bit), or just assist fix this mentioned issue ?

Note that when the script calls fileExists method, it does takes care of quotes properly: if not fileExists("\"" .. file .. "\"") then return nil, "File does not exist" end

Please provide the file name having the problem. Does it contain non-English letters? — Egor Skriptunoff, Jul 25 '22 at 23:54
An example could be something like `12MovieName 2022 Dubbed (Unofficial) 1080p www.moviewebsite.com HDRip ESub 2.9GB.mkv`. Also the extension uses this syntax for dealing with long filepaths `file:///...`, so I don't think long filenames could be issue, but I may be wrong. — Vicky Dev, Jul 25 '22 at 23:56
It doesn't even work with simple filenames that contain spaces and hyphen at most, Lua/VLC libraries are ridiculous... And No, the file I am trying to delete originally also doesn't contain any complex characters than just round brackets, as you have already seen above. — Vicky Dev, Jul 26 '22 at 12:47

Vicky Dev · Accepted Answer · 2022-07-27T01:27:56.297

After hours of troubleshooting, I was able to fix the issue, which was due to the way the quoted(space-containing) file path was passed to another function and the Lua library method of os.remove not working on the passed parameter.

So I just had an idea, I am mainly using Windows OS only, then why not convert the script to rely on Windows OS core(batch/cmd) functions only and do the safe checking of whether file exists and then delete with those core Windows functions too.

And so I just did that and got the plugin to actually check whether the file exists and delete the file, if it does then delete it. Here's the working code:

-- Copy this file to %ProgramFiles%\VideoLAN\VLC\lua\extensions\ and restart VLC Media player.
function descriptor()
    return {
        title = "VLC Delete Media File(Windows only)";
        version = "1.0";
        author = "Vicky Dev";
        shortdesc = "&Remove current file from playlist and disk";
        description = [[
<h1>VLC Delete Media File(Windows only)</h1>"
When you're playing a file, use this to easily
delete the current file from your <b>playlist</b> and <b>disk</b> with one click.<br>
Disclaimer: The author is not responsible for damage caused by this extension.
        ]];
    }
end

function sleep(seconds)
    local t0 = os.clock()
    local tOriginal = t0
    while os.clock() - t0 <= seconds and os.clock() >= tOriginal do end
end

function removeItem()
    local id = vlc.playlist.current()
    vlc.playlist.delete(id)
    vlc.playlist.gotoitem(id + 1)
    vlc.deactivate()
end

function activate()
    local item = vlc.input.item()
    local uri = item:uri()
    uri = string.gsub(uri, "^file:///", "")
    uri = vlc.strings.decode_uri(uri)
    path = string.gsub(uri, "/", "\\")
    vlc.msg.info("[VLC Delete Media File(Windows only)] removing: "..uri.." : "..path)
    removeItem()
    retval, err = os.execute("if exist ".."\""..path.."\"".." @(call )")
    if (type(retval) == 'number' and retval == 0) then
        os.execute("del /f /a /q ".."\""..path.."\"")
    end
end

function click_ok()
    d:delete()
    vlc.deactivate()
end

function deactivate()
    vlc.deactivate()
end

function close()
    deactivate()
end

function meta_changed()
end

Hope this helps anyone who wants this cool feature of deleting the media files from player itself, instead of going to the location and doing it.

VLC Media Player LUA Extension fails detecting whether the media file actually exists or not in Windows

1 Answers1

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