Heads up! To view this whole video, sign in with your Courses account or enroll in your free 7-day trial. Sign In Enroll
Preview
Start a free Courses trial
to watch this video
You often need to write to a file to store data for later use. Python makes this really straightforward!
open(filename, mode="r")opens a file. More info in the docs.
file.write("hello world") would write "hello world" to whatever file the file variable points at.
file.close() closes the pointer to the file file.
The two most common modes or flags for writing are "w" for truncating and then writing, and "a" for appending to the file.
The context manager pattern for dealing with files is:
with open("my_file.txt", "a") as file:
file.write("Hello world")
Related Discussions
Have questions about this video? Start a discussion with the community and Treehouse staff.
Sign upRelated Discussions
Have questions about this video? Start a discussion with the community and Treehouse staff.
Sign up
[MUSIC]
0:00
Hi, I'm Kenneth,
the Python teacher here at Treehouse.
0:04
Quite often, when we're writing code,
0:08
we get the idea that we should
put handy information into files.
0:09
Or just write things out to a file so
we'll have it later.
0:12
I don't mean our scripts, of course.
0:15
Those are saved into files.
0:17
I mean things like, I'm going to ask
the user how they're feeling today,
0:19
and then save it into a file.
0:22
Thankfully, Python makes this easy.
0:24
We only have to know one
function to open the file, and
0:26
a couple of flags to
control how it's opened.
0:28
Let's get over to workspaces
to see how to do this.
0:30
Opening a file in Python
is surprisingly easy.
0:34
But before we can read a file,
we need to write a file, all right?
0:37
I want to write a script that will let me
jot down reminders and notes and such.
0:42
Let's call it remember.py.
0:47
So let's make a new file, remember.py.
0:49
Alright, cool, and let's add in a def
rememberer, and a thing to remember.
0:54
And we'll say open file,
write thing to file, close file.
1:03
And our function has to do something so
we'll just say pass.
1:09
And then let's say if
name is equal to main
1:13
then run rememberer, and
remember should get some input.
1:18
What should I remember?
1:24
So cool,
there's that let's go ahead and run it.
1:28
And what should I remember?
1:33
I don't know remember the milk.
1:34
All right, so that's cool.
1:36
But we actually need to do
the commented things, right?
1:38
So luckily Python gives us this
function that's called open.
1:41
And so we can do like file equals open
1:46
database.txt and
let's just try that, all right?
1:49
So we get the file open and
1:54
we've put it into this pointer,
this variable, called file.
1:56
All right, so let's try running that.
2:01
And you should remember the milk.
2:03
That's a big exception.
2:06
What this exception tells me, is that I
don't have a file named database.txt.
2:08
That's why we get the error.
2:14
We get an error because
the file doesn't exist.
2:15
This a good time to talk about flags.
2:18
Pythons open function uses flags
to tell it how to open the file.
2:20
Like we want to open it for reading,
we want to open it for writing,
2:25
we want to open it for
appending, and other ways.
2:28
By default, if we don't give it an
argument, which is what we've done here.
2:33
Then, it opens it for reading, and reading
kind of requires the file to exist, right?
2:36
Currently, there isn't a database.txt so
Python can't open it.
2:43
So, let's add in the "w" flag.
2:48
W, for write.
2:52
Right?
2:54
So, cool.
2:55
Let's run this again.
2:56
And I want you to remember the milk.
2:58
No errors.
3:00
Great.
3:01
All right, so now, let's see,
let's refresh this over here.
3:01
And when you see that we have
a database.txt, there's nothing in it.
3:06
That's fine, we didn't actually
write anything to the file.
3:09
Let's do that now.
3:13
All right so,
writing the files is really simple.
3:14
We do whatever variable points to
the file and then we do a dot and
3:17
then we do write and then we do whatever
it is we want to write that file.
3:23
So I'm going to do thing and then I'm
gonna add in a new line character.
3:29
That way each thing gets to
be put on to it's own line.
3:35
All right, so let's run that.
3:37
And again, let's say remember the milk.
3:41
And let's go look at database.txt.
3:43
And milk is in there and
there's a new line.
3:46
So, cool, that's pretty neat.
3:49
That's the thing we wanted to be
remembered, and it's in there.
3:51
It's important that we can remember
more than one thing, right.
3:54
So, let's do that.
3:58
And I've already put in milk, so
the other thing I need to remember is,
3:59
I need to remember to get orange juice.
4:03
So, I'm gonna put in orange juice.
4:06
And let's go check and make sure
both those things are in our file.
4:08
Only have orange juice.
4:12
Our old record's gone and
it's been replaced with a new one.
4:13
So, I wonder why that is?
4:18
Let's check the documentation and
let's find out.
4:20
Let's go over here and look for
open and there's open.
4:25
And let's look at these, these are the
modes that I was telling you about.
4:33
So there's R for
reading which is the default.
4:37
There's W for
writing which truncates the file first.
4:39
Aha!
See it truncates.
4:45
Truncates means it deletes
everything out of the file.
4:47
It shortens the file down to 0 bytes.
4:49
There's nothing in the file,
and then it writes.
4:53
Okay, that's not what we want.
4:56
This is why you read the documentation.
4:57
So A opens it,
appends to be in the file if it exists.
5:00
Okay, that's that probably what we want.
5:05
We probably want A.
5:06
And again,
this is why it pays to read the docs.
5:08
Alright, let's fix our script.
5:10
So come over here, we don't wanna open
it with W, we wanna open it with A.
5:12
All right, so right now my database
5:15
file has orange juice in it, so I'm gonna
add milk cuz I still need to get milk.
5:21
All right, so milk and
let's come over here and look at database.
5:24
Sweet, there's orange juice and
there's milk.
5:30
Everything is in there, and
they each have their own line.
5:32
They're all in the file.
5:35
We need to do one more thing,
we need to close the file.
5:37
Now if you're really building this, and
5:41
you're really building it the way that
I'm building it, when this function ends,
5:43
when rememberer hits the end of it and
it's done.
5:46
Then everything inside it
gets garbage collected.
5:50
Python takes all that stuff and goes,
you don't need this anymore, and
5:53
throws it away.
5:56
Which means that the file being open,
the file would be closed.
5:57
So it would be fine, it would be garbage
collected and then it would be closed.
6:01
But, I like being really
explicit about this.
6:06
I don't want to know that
I'm closing the file.
6:08
I want to make sure that file is closed.
6:10
Some I'm gonna do it on purpose.
6:12
So I'm gonna do file.close, not clone,
6:14
close and
I know that the file has been closed.
6:17
So if I run this again, and
6:22
I need to pick up a sweater,
I know the file's been closed.
6:23
Nothing changed outwardly, but Python
opened the file, Python wrote to the file,
6:29
and then Python closed the file.
6:33
This pattern is really,
really common, and it's actually so
6:36
common that there's a built
in easier way to do it.
6:39
We can use the with keyword to make
what's known as a context manager.
6:43
We're defining a block like a if or
a while and inside of that block,
6:48
the variables only exist for
a certain time.
6:54
If I come over here, and I say with, and
6:58
I take out the file equals,
open that as file.
7:03
Now we have, inside here, we have a block.
7:07
Inside this block, the file exists and
the file points to that opened file.
7:09
But once this block ends, file goes away,
which is really awesome and handy.
7:14
So we're actually just going to
indent both of those and since file
7:20
goes away once that with is done,
I don't need those two lines anymore.
7:25
So all I need is,
7:31
open up the file in a context manager,
write the thing into the file.
7:33
So, cool we have two lines that
are replaced our three lines.
7:38
Let's run it one more time
to make sure that it works.
7:41
I remember to get a sword and
7:44
if come look at my database, I have
orange juice, milk, sweater and a sword.
7:47
And it's kinda funny that
orange shows up like that.
7:52
Anyway, so great.
7:55
Now you know how to write to files.
7:56
You need to sign up for Treehouse in order to download course files.
Sign upYou need to sign up for Treehouse in order to set up Workspace
Sign up