Python | shutil.copytree() method

25 Jun, 2019
Shutil module in Python provides many functions of high-level operations on files and collections of files. It comes under Python’s standard utility modules. This module helps in automating process of copying and removal of files and directories.shutil.copytree() method recursively copies an entire directory tree rooted at source (src) to the destination directory. The destination directory, named by (dst) must not already exist. It will be created during copying. Permissions and times of directories are copied with copystat() and individual files are copied using shutil.copy2().
Syntax: shutil.copytree(src, dst, symlinks = False, ignore = None, copy_function = copy2, igonre_dangling_symlinks = False)Parameters:src: A string representing the path of the source directory.dest: A string representing the path of the destination.symlinks (optional) : This parameter accepts True or False, depending on which the metadata of the original links or linked links will be copied to the new tree.ignore (optional) : If ignore is given, it must be a callable that will receive as its arguments the directory being visited by copytree(), and a list of its contents, as returned by os.listdir().copy_function (optional): The default value of this parameter is copy2. We can use other copy function like copy() for this parameter.igonre_dangling_symlinks (optional) : This parameter value when set to True is used to put a silence on the exception raised if the file pointed by the symlink doesn’t exist.Return Value: This method returns a string which represents the path of newly created directory.
Example #1 :Using shutil.copytree() method to copy file from source to destination
# Python program to explain shutil.copytree() method        # importing os module import os    # importing shutil module import shutil    # path path = 'C:/Users / Rajnish / Desktop / GeeksforGeeks'   # List files and directories # in 'C:/Users / Rajnish / Desktop / GeeksforGeeks' print("Before copying file:") print(os.listdir(path))       # Source path src = 'C:/Users / Rajnish / Desktop / GeeksforGeeks / source'   # Destination path dest = 'C:/Users / Rajnish / Desktop / GeeksforGeeks / destination'   # Copy the content of # source to destination destination = shutil.copytree(src, dest)    # List files and directories # in "C:/Users / Rajnish / Desktop / GeeksforGeeks" print("After copying file:") print(os.listdir(path))    # Print path of newly # created file print("Destination path:", destination)
Before copying file:
['source']
After copying file:
['destination', 'source']
Destination path: C:/Users/Rajnish/Desktop/GeeksforGeeks/destination

Example #2 :Using shutil.copytree() method to copy file by using shutil.copy() method.
# Python program to explain shutil.copytree() method         # importing os module import os     # importing shutil module import shutil     # path path = 'C:/Users / Rajnish / Desktop / GeeksforGeeks'    # List files and directories # in 'C:/Users / Rajnish / Desktop / GeeksforGeeks' print("Before copying file:") print(os.listdir(path))         # Source path src = 'C:/Users / Rajnish / Desktop / GeeksforGeeks / source'    # Destination path dest = 'C:/Users / Rajnish / Desktop / GeeksforGeeks / destination'    # Copy the content of # source to destination # using shutil.copy() as parameterdestination = shutil.copytree(src, dest, copy_function = shutil.copy)     # List files and directories # in "C:/Users / Rajnish / Desktop / GeeksforGeeks" print("After copying file:") print(os.listdir(path))     # Print path of newly # created file print("Destination path:", destination)
Before copying file:
['source']
After copying file:
['destination', 'source']
Destination path: C:/Users/Rajnish/Desktop/GeeksforGeeks/destination

Python-shutil
Python
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