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(python2.1-lib.info)dircache

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Cached directory listings
=========================

This manual section was written by Moshe Zadka
<moshez@zadka.site.co.il>.
Return directory listing, with cache mechanism.

The `dircache' module defines a function for reading directory listing
using a cache, and cache invalidation using the MTIME of the directory.
Additionally, it defines a function to annotate directories by appending
a slash.

The `dircache' module defines the following functions:

`listdir(path)'
     Return a directory listing of PATH, as gotten from `os.listdir()'.
     Note that unless PATH changes, further call to `listdir()' will
     not re-read the directory structure.

     Note that the list returned should be regarded as read-only.
     (Perhaps a future version should change it to return a tuple?)

`opendir(path)'
     Same as `listdir()'. Defined for backwards compatibility.

`annotate(head, list)'
     Assume LIST is a list of paths relative to HEAD, and append, in
     place, a `/' to each path which points to a directory.

     >>> import dircache
     >>> a=dircache.listdir('/')
     >>> a=a[:] # Copy the return value so we can change 'a'
     >>> a
     ['bin', 'boot', 'cdrom', 'dev', 'etc', 'floppy', 'home', 'initrd', 'lib', 'lost+
     found', 'mnt', 'proc', 'root', 'sbin', 'tmp', 'usr', 'var', 'vmlinuz']
     >>> dircache.annotate('/', a)
     >>> a
     ['bin/', 'boot/', 'cdrom/', 'dev/', 'etc/', 'floppy/', 'home/', 'initrd/', 'lib/
     ', 'lost+found/', 'mnt/', 'proc/', 'root/', 'sbin/', 'tmp/', 'usr/', 'var/', 'vm
     linuz']