Relative path seperators for windows and linux in python

Question

I am creating a program and in this program, my folder structure is something like this

-> images
   -> image_1.png
-> test.py

In test.py, I need to access image_1.png via a relative path such as images/image_1.png in Linux. But in windows, it's images\image_1.png.

From my research, I have found out that / also works in windows as a path separator. Is this applicable to this case? Do I need to use os.sep or something like that, or in all relative paths / will work fine as a path separator in both windows and Linux?

Ramsudharsan Manoharan · Accepted Answer · 2022-09-11 21:00:34Z

2

You can use os.path.normpath as shown below. It can adjust to both Linux and Windows as per the system and it also resolves the path into the shortest possible path to the destination. Ex: /home/foo/../A will be resolved to /home/A.

Usage:

import os.path
 
# Path
path = './home//user/Documents'
 
 
# Normalize the specified path
# using os.path.normpath() method
norm_path = os.path.normpath(path)
 
# Print the normalized path 
print(norm_path)
# prints home/user/Documents in Linux
# prints home\user\Documents in Windows

For more info read this article: https://www.geeksforgeeks.org/python-os-path-normpath-method/

answered Sep 11, 2022 at 21:00

Ramsudharsan Manoharan

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2 Comments

Azmyin Md. Kamal Over a year ago

Tested in Windows 11 and it works

NoahVerner Over a year ago

Does this work on Mac too? (is it cross-operating system?)

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