Parse a Directory - Insert a File

user04

Hey Everybody,

I am attempting to write a script that I would assume would be easy, but am a novice at php so I'm not sure where to start.

I would like to start in a root directory of a web server and parse every directory and subdirectory and insert a blank index.html file into each directory and subdirectory until I've reached the last directory and then the script stops.

Any suggestions?

Thanks!

bradgrafelman

Use [man]glob/man to parse a directory (search for '*' - just the wildcard). Filter out '.' and '..' (the current and parent directory references, respectively). Loop through each result and use [man]is_dir/man to check if it's a directory. If it is, pass this path back to your function (e.g. your function will recurse - repeatedly call itself with a directory as its parameter). When you're done with that, insert the index.html file into the current directory.

In other words, your function would first scan the current directory (you can start at $_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'] as an example) for more directories which it would then pass back to itself. When it's done scanning, it inserts the file into the current directory.

Before you get started on writing this, though, can you explain to us why you want to do this? There may very well be a better (and by better I mean not only easier but also more efficient) way to accomplish what you're after.

user04

Brad,

Thank you so much for the reply. Sounds good, except I'm not starting in the root SERVER directory...starting in the "image" directory. So how would I set a variable equal to the directory url and pass that as the starting point?

Also, the reason behind why I'm trying to do this is I have a number of image directories that need to be "unviewable", but able to be linked to. Meaning.

www.website.com/images/1/

has images in it that can be linked to, but I don't want anyone to able view the directory itself

Make sense?

Is there a quicker more efficient route?

bradgrafelman

user04 wrote:
Is there a quicker more efficient route?

Yes!

Don't use index files, use .htaccess files:

Options -Indexes

That'll disable directory indexing for whatever directory you place the .htaccess file in as well as all subdirectories.

user04

Brad,

Thanks for the .htaccess refresher, but I will still need to place that file in every directory and subdirectory? I have hundreds of directories to place either an index.html or in this case, the .htaccess file.

Am I understanding you correctly? If so, then the script would still need to be written to place the .htaccess file in, right?

user04

Brad,

Okay, I was TOTALLY misreading what you wrote. I changed the .htaccess file and it sets them to forbidden, which is great. Thank you very much.

However, in the case that any file, "not necessarily" a blank index file, needs to be inserted into every dir and subdir, I am still hashing out a script now, just to get more familiar with php.

What I have so far parses all dirs and places them in an array (and currently prints to the screen to show the dirs).

I'm assuming next I need to, while looping, check to see if the current directory has "file A" and if so, move to the next, if not place a copy of the file in that directory and move on.

The issue is, how do I "place" a file in there? I could have the file in a current directory and have that url = to a variable, but how do actually "put/place" it in there?

Thanks in advance...

function listdirs($dir) {
    static $alldirs = array();
    $dirs = glob($dir . '/*', GLOB_ONLYDIR);
// GLOB_ONLYDIR - Return only directory entries which match the pattern " dir + '/*' "

if (count($dirs) > 0) {
    foreach ($dirs as $d)				// Value of current element in $dirs array is set to element in variable $d...
	{$alldirs[] = $d;}					// ...which is then set and stored in $alldirs array.
}

for ($k=0; $k<count($alldirs); $k++) {
 	print "$alldirs[$k] <br />";
    }

return $alldirs;
}

listdirs('images');					// Change this directory to start parsing from.

bradgrafelman

Check if the file already exists using [man]file_exists/man and, if not, you could create the file using the [man]file_put_contents/man.