Ask a Jedi: Getting the current directory
I sometimes like to start the morning off with an easy question. Makes me feel all smarty-pants and stuff. Here is a quickie from Patrick that may actually be news to some folks, so hopefully it will be easy for me - helpful for others.
Hi Ray, me again I have a, maybe silly, question about getting the current directory. I have to get the current directory in which a template resides. But I don't want the full path.
If i run www.example.com/folder/index.cfm i should get "folder" but not path/to/somewhere/in/the/system/folder. I tried with expandpath("./") and getDirectoryFrom Path(ExpandPath(CGI.SCRIPT_NAME)) but this always returns a full path. Any built in function i forgot to try? Thanks for a hint!
This is two issues here. How do I get the directory from a full path, and how do I get the current directory. The first one is simple. The getDirectoryFromPath() function will take any full path and return just the directory. There is also a corresponding getFileFromPath() function.
The second issue is slightly more complicated. ColdFusion has two functions related to getting the current template. They are getBaseTemplatePath() and getCurrentTemplatePath(). I tend to forget which does what, but consider this first example:
<cffunction name="onRequestStart" returnType="boolean" output="true">
<cfargument name="thePage" type="string" required="true">
<cfoutput>
getCurrentTemplatePath()=#getCurrentTemplatePath()#<br>
getBaseTemplatePath()=#getBaseTemplatePath()#<br>
<p>
</cfoutput>
<cfreturn true>
</cffunction>
When I run test4.cfm, I get:
getCurrentTemplatePath()=/Users/ray/Documents/Web Sites/webroot/Application.cfc
getBaseTemplatePath()=/Users/ray/Documents/Web Sites/webroot/test4.cfm
The getCurrentTemplatePath refers to the actual file being run right now, which is Application.cfc, and getBaseTemplatePath returns to the main file being executed.
If that sounds a bit unclear, forgive me. As I said, I always forget the difference (one reason I'll fail the CF8 cert probably). In general you are going to want to use getCurrentTemplatePath if you want to consider the file where the actual function is being run.
Comments
If understand correctly you want to get the directory, relative to your webroot, of the currently executing template right?
For example:
URL:http://localhost/mycfstuff/samples/index.cfm
Full Path:C:\Inetpub\wwwroot\mycf\samples\index.cfm
Want:\mycf\samples\
You can use expandPath("/") to get the path to webroot
C:\Inetpub\wwwroot\
you can use getDirectoryFromPath(getCurrentTemplatePath()) to get the full directory: C:\Inetpub\wwwroot\mycf\samples\
The some simple majik to get just the directory.
right(getdirectoryfrompath(getcurrenttemplatepath()),len(getdirectoryfrompath(getcurrenttemplatepath()))-len(expandpath("/"))+1)
gives you: \mycf\samples\
You have to add the +1 at the end in order to keep the slash in the front.
Perhaps not the most elegant way but from what I understood of your question you get JUST the path from the webroot to your template.
Cheers,
http://blog.pengoworks.com/index.cfm/2006/9/27/CFM...
This script will parse out the path to in the URL. You could easily modify the code to only generate the path if that's all you wanted as well.
One problem with the solution you posted is that it may not work in all cases--for example when virtual directories are being used with the webserver. In those cases the URL path is much different than the OS path.
I'm wondering because the CFCATCH exception variable includes the complete calling stack (this is probably not the right term), and I could imagine some potential uses for accessing that info at runtime.
( Note: I'm thinking of something more elegant than throwing an exception and extracting the data from the CFCATCH variable; I write some ugly code, but that seems like overkill. )
Thats very true, but then you could also use the PATH_INFO cgi variable to give you the relative path to the executing page, id does give you the page as well but you could also quite simply remove it.
PATH_INFO=/mycf/samples/index.cfm
But it really depends on what you are looking for as you mentioned in your first post, the os path or the web path
Just a heads up that not every webserver will populate the cgi.path_info. I believe IIS might be the only webserver that does. You always have to be a bit wary when using CGI variables, since what's returned varies by webserver.
Yep. getBaseTagList will give you a list of everyone above you. To get the guy right above you, it would just be the last item.
/dir1/dir2/what-im-viewing
but it might actually be
/some/dir/index.cfm
I'm actually not at all familiar with rewrites and ColdFusion, and I am asking this out of curiosity. Would the solutions provided be fore the actual url, or the rewritten url?
<cfset thisDirectory = ExpandPath(".")>
<cfoutput>#getFileFromPath(thisDirectory)#</cfouptut>
http://blog.pengoworks.com/index.cfm/2008/5/8/Gett...
This uses the getPageContext() to return the path info--which should be more reliable than CGI.path_info.
@Trent:
This *should* work for virtual or remapped folders as well (since it should be return the path as seen by the browser,) but I have not tested it.
Ray wrote me, i should use listlast(application.directory,"/\"), 'cause i have set this:
<cfset application.Path = ExpandPath(CGI.SCRIPT_NAME)>
<cfset application.Directory = GetDirectoryFromPath(application.Path)>
What i need is the path relative to the executed template.
So if my URL is www.example.com/some/other/folders/index.cfm
I only want folders. The listlast works, but only if i'm in a subdirectory. Calling the listlast from the webroot returns htdocs, of course. But this can be handled.
My problem is, that i don't know if the project i'm currently work on, will be placed in the webroot or in some subfolder(s).
If the URL is www.example.com/shop/products/computers/index.cfm
I want computers. With / or not never mind. (hope this is correct english, i'm german ;))
Did you see my comment? It gives you just that without having to use a UDF.
I blogged it at http://www.stephenwithington.com
If you use this:
<cfset thisDirectory = ExpandPath(".") />
<cfoutput>#getFileFromPath(thisDirectory)#</cfoutput>
The result is "folder"
Sorry, i missed your post. It's another good solution, of course!
Thanks! I'd never looked closely at this tag, always having considered it one of the odder additions - now I see how it could be useful, thanks!
The only issue with your solution is it does not work if you're using virutal folders or using a remapping rule. If those are an issue, it works fine.
I wrote the UDF with the intent on working on the actually URL in the browser--which can vary drastically from the OS path.
It sounds like he may be wanting to get the directory relative to the webserver, not from the OS path--but I could be wrong.