On Wed, 19 Oct 2022 at 09:17, Todd <toddr...@gmail.com> wrote: > > On Tue, Oct 18, 2022 at 5:00 PM Chris Angelico <ros...@gmail.com> wrote: >> >> On Wed, 19 Oct 2022 at 06:50, Todd <toddr...@gmail.com> wrote: >> > >> > Currently, pathlib supports pretty much all common filesystem operations. >> > You can create, move, and delete both files and directories. One big >> > omission is copying. You need shutil for that. >> > >> > Whatever the original intent might have been behind pathlib, it is now >> > effectively the standard tool for filesystem operations. As such, >> > excluding copying alone from basic operations creates an unnecessary >> > hurdle for users. It also increases the difficulty of doing such >> > operations since there is no hint within the pathlib documentation on how >> > to copy, new users basically need to google it to find out. That is fine >> > for less common operations, but far from ideal from a basic one like >> > copying. >> > >> >> Ah. I would look at solving this the other way: since this really >> isn't a path operation (in the same sense that moving/renaming and >> deleting are), keep it in shutil, but improve discoverability with a >> docs reference. >> >> ChrisA > > > How is it any less of a "path operation" than moving files, reading and > writing files, making directories, and deleting files?
At a file system level, those are nothing more than directory entry manipulation. (Reading and writing might count as slightly more than that, but practicality beats purity.) Copying a file involves a lot more work, and is not a simple operation done in the directory entry, so it's more of a separate tool. Also, not everyone agrees on what "copying" means, so there'll be various platform-specific concepts. In theory, you could take literally every possible action that could be done on a file and make it into a Path method. Do we need a method to read a .WAV file and return its headers, or is that better left in the 'wave' module? There's a reason that huge slabs of Python are built on protocols rather than methods. Assuming that shutil.copyfile accepts Path objects (and if it doesn't, that should definitely be fixed), is it really a problem for the Path objects to not have a copy method? I agree with you about discoverability; since copying IS a common operation, it would be great to have a docs reference pointing people to shutil. But I don't think we need every single operation as a Path method, and the easiest place to draw the line is at directory entry operations. ChrisA _______________________________________________ Python-ideas mailing list -- python-ideas@python.org To unsubscribe send an email to python-ideas-le...@python.org https://mail.python.org/mailman3/lists/python-ideas.python.org/ Message archived at https://mail.python.org/archives/list/python-ideas@python.org/message/UMOHZP7REUJH5MMM5OL5X3V5ZLU5U24C/ Code of Conduct: http://python.org/psf/codeofconduct/
