Handling Filepaths in python

Question

I am using stings to hold filepaths in python and I want to replace the single backslash with a double backslash for use in cmd but I have a problem where due to the backslash it is changing a letter into a special characters. For example:

string="C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe"
print(sting)

outputs:

"C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox\x0cirefox.exe"

when I want it to output

"C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe"

This problem continues when I want to replace the "\" with a "\\" using

string.replace("\\","\\\\")

Instead of it outputing:

"C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Mozilla Firefox\\firefox.exe"

It outputs:

"C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Mozilla Firefox\xocirefox.exe"

Oblig. xkcd

Cong Ma
– Cong Ma

2017-04-17 12:45:41 +00:00
Commented Apr 17, 2017 at 12:45 — Cong Ma
– Cong Ma, Commented Apr 17, 2017 at 12:45

Tom Burrows · Accepted Answer · 2017-04-17 13:15:00Z

1

Use raw strings:

>>> string=r"C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe"
>>>print(string)
C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe

>>> print(string.replace('\\','\\\\'))
C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Mozilla Firefox\\firefox.exe

edited Apr 17, 2017 at 13:15

Tom Burrows

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answered Apr 17, 2017 at 12:46

Mohammad Athar

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Comments

Tom Burrows · Accepted Answer · 2017-04-17 12:53:04Z

1

You can use raw strings to simply ignore the backslash.

>>> string=r"C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe"
>>> print(string)
"C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe"

You can find out more about this in the Python documentation for lexical analysis

edited Apr 17, 2017 at 12:53

Tom Burrows

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answered Apr 17, 2017 at 12:44

Grr

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5 Comments

Nat Over a year ago

Thanks this has fixed my problem i will accept this answer when it allows me to.

Nat Over a year ago

how can you convert a variable holding a string into a raw string?

Cong Ma Over a year ago

The "raw string" is just a syntax feature for typing string literals in the source code. At Python object level there's no difference.

Nat Over a year ago

the probelm i have is that i need to take the string in the question and use it in the cmd using subprocess but it needs to be used in a variable which will can only be assinged as a normal string but if i try to replace the slashes i encounter the problem above so i need a way to tell python the variable should be a raw string when im calling it.

Cong Ma Over a year ago

So there's another problem... Perhaps you could write another question describing the exact situation.

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