cross-platform splitting of path in python

Question

I'd like something that has the same effect as this:

>>> path = "/foo/bar/baz/file"
>>> path_split = path.rsplit('/')[1:]
>>> path_split
['foo', 'bar', 'baz', 'file']

But that will work with Windows paths too. I know that there is an os.path.split() but that doesn't do what I want, and I didn't see anything that does.

Answer 1

Python 3.4 introduced a new module pathlib. pathlib.Path provides file system related methods, while pathlib.PurePath operates completely independent of the file system:

>>> from pathlib import PurePath
>>> path = "/foo/bar/baz/file"
>>> path_split = PurePath(path).parts
>>> path_split
('\', 'foo', 'bar', 'baz', 'file')

You can use PosixPath and WindowsPath explicitly when desired:

>>> from pathlib import PureWindowsPath, PurePosixPath
>>> PureWindowsPath(path).parts
('\', 'foo', 'bar', 'baz', 'file')
>>> PurePosixPath(path).parts
('/', 'foo', 'bar', 'baz', 'file')

And of course, it works with Windows paths as well:

>>> wpath = r"C:fooarazfile"
>>> PurePath(wpath).parts
('C:\', 'foo', 'bar', 'baz', 'file')
>>> PureWindowsPath(wpath).parts
('C:\', 'foo', 'bar', 'baz', 'file')
>>> PurePosixPath(wpath).parts
('C:\foo\bar\baz\file',)
>>>
>>> wpath = r"C:foo/bar/baz/file"
>>> PurePath(wpath).parts
('C:\', 'foo', 'bar', 'baz', 'file')
>>> PureWindowsPath(wpath).parts
('C:\', 'foo', 'bar', 'baz', 'file')
>>> PurePosixPath(wpath).parts
('C:\foo', 'bar', 'baz', 'file')

Huzzah for Python devs constantly improving the language!