Hi I am writing on an application, that is supposed to read a file into a single string: My program though, when I run it, gives me an error, that the called file is non existent 'C:\ \Documents and Settings\ \Fred\ \My Documents\ \School\ \Bio' Is it normal that python adds the space and extra backslash? Because if I print the path of the called file before the open command, it normally prints it with only one backslash. Is there any possiblity of surpressing this? I am using Python 2.3.5 with Pywin built 163 on Windows. Thanks for all help -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list