Working with files and directories

PowerMill contains a number of commands and functions for creating and manipulating files on disc. The following commands can be used to delete and copy files and directories:

DELETE FILE <filename>

DELETE DIRECTORY <directory>

COPY FILE <source-file> <destination file>

COPY DIRECTORY <source directory> <destination-directory>

The command CD changes the working directory:

// change working directory to "C:\temp"
CD "C:\temp"

// change working directory back to where PowerMill
started from
CD

The command MKDIR will create a directory path:

MKDIR "C:\temp\\output\pm_project"

The command will create all directories in the path if they do not exist already.

File and directory functions

PowerMill contains a number of parameter functions that can be used to examine the file structure of the disc:

• string pwd() — Returns the current working directory path.

• bool file_exists(filepath) — Returns true if filepath is an existing file.

• bool dir_exists(dirpath) — Returns true if dirpath is an existing directory.

• list list_files(string flags,string directory[, string filetype]) — Returns a list of files that match the flags and optional filetype. The flags parameter can be either 'all', 'files', or 'dirs' with an additional '+' suffix. If the '+' suffix is given then all subdirectories are listed.

Example

// get a list of all the files in the working directory
STRING LIST files = list_files("files",pwd())

// get all the stl files in the C:\temp directory
$files = list_files("files","c:\temp",".stl")

// get all the directories and subdirectories in the working directory
$files = list_files("dirs+", pwd())