[Tutor] How to replace the '\'s in a path with '/'s?

[Sandip Bhattacharya]

On Sat, Jul 30, 2011 at 10:28:11PM -0700, Richard D. Moores wrote:
> File "c:\P32Working\untitled-5.py", line 2
>    return path.replace('\', '/')
>                                ^
> SyntaxError: EOL while scanning string literal
> Process terminated with an exit code of 1

The first backslash up there is escaping the ending quote. This is  what
you want:
    return path.replace('\\', '/')

Generally, converting slashes manually should be kept at a minimum. You
should be using library functions as much as possible. The experts here
can correct me here, but this is a roundabout way I would be doing this:

    # I use a linux machine. Using this to work with Windows paths
    # Use os.path if you are on windows
    import ntpath

    # Use raw strings so that backslash doesnt matter
    path=r'C:\Users\Dick\Desktop\Documents\Notes\College Notes.rtf'

    #take out drive first because ntpath.split end sentinel is predictable that way
    drive,rest = ntpath.splitdrive(path)

    # This will store the path components
    comps = []
    comps.append(drive)

    while rest != '\\':
        parts = ntpath.split(rest)
        comps.insert(1,parts[1])
        rest = parts[0]


    print '/'.join(comps)

I am not happy with the loop to collect the components. But I couldn't
find a single path function which splits a path into all the components
in one go.

- Sandip