Ignore hidden files when using list.files in R

Question

I wish to copy an xlsx file from a really really slow network drive to my RStudio project directory.

Although my file name in my specified file directory is unique, when I run list.files() in that directory I get two versions of the same file. I am assuming the second is a hidden version of the file.

current_folder <- "//server/address1/address2/address3/Info/more/and more/and more again/R Code"

new_folder <- getwd()

list_of_files <- list.files(path = current_folder, 
                            pattern = "class_xwalk_new.xlsx", 
                            all.files = FALSE, 
                            recursive = FALSE,
                            full.names = TRUE)

> list_of_files
[1] "//server/address1/address2/address3/Info/more/and more/and more again/R Code/~$class_xwalk_new.xlsx"
[2] "//server/address1/address2/address3/Info/more/and more/and more again/R Code/class_xwalk_new.xlsx"

Can anyone suggest a way I can just pick up the second file i.e. the one without ~$

score 3 · Accepted Answer · answered Jul 03 '20 at 20:56

3

You could use stringr like this:

library(stringr)
list_of_files[!str_detect(list_of_files, "~$")]

answered Jul 03 '20 at 20:56

eastclintw00d

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score 2 · Answer 2 · answered Jul 04 '20 at 01:49

You can use grep with fixed, value and invert as TRUE.

list_of_files <- c("//server/address1/address2/address3/Info/more/and more/and more again/R Code/~$class_xwalk_new.xlsx",
                   "//server/address1/address2/address3/Info/more/and more/and more again/R Code/class_xwalk_new.xlsx")

grep('~$', list_of_files, fixed = TRUE, value = TRUE, invert = TRUE)

Or str_subset from stringr :

stringr::str_subset(list_of_files, fixed('~$'), negate = TRUE)

score 0 · Answer 3 · answered Jul 04 '20 at 00:05

Specify a pattern that says your filename is exactly class_xwalk_new.xlsx, not a pattern saying it contains that string. For example, "^class_xwalk_new.xlsx$", so your search would be

list_of_files <- list.files(path = current_folder, 
                            pattern = "^class_xwalk_new.xlsx$", 
                            all.files = FALSE, 
                            recursive = FALSE,
                            full.names = TRUE)

Ignore hidden files when using list.files in R

3 Answers3