ballerina/file

Overview

This module provides APIs to create, delete, rename the file/directory, retrieve metadata of the given file, and manipulate the file paths in a way that is compatible with the operating system, and a Directory Listener, which is used to listen to the file changes in a directory in the local file system.

Directory listener

The file:Listener is used to monitor all the files and subdirectories inside the specified directory.

A Listener endpoint can be defined using the mandatory path parameter and the optional recursive parameter as follows.

listener file:Listener inFolder = new ({
    path: "<The directory path>",
    recursive: false
});

If the listener needs to monitor subdirectories of the given directory, recursive needs to be set to true. The default value of this is false.

A Service has the defined remote methods with the file:FileEvent and can be exposed via a Listener endpoint. When there are changes in the listening directory, the file:FileEvent will be triggered with the action of the file such as creating, modifying, or deleting.

The remote methods supported by the Service are as follows.

onCreate: This method is invoked once a new file is created in the listening directory.

onDelete: This method is invoked once an existing file is deleted from the listening directory.

onModify: This method is invoked once an existing file is modified in the listening directory.

The following code sample shows how to create a Service with the onCreate remote method and attach it to the above Listener endpoint:

service "localObserver" on inFolder {

    remote function onCreate(file:FileEvent m) {
        string msg = "Create: " + m.name;
        log:printInfo(msg);
    }
}

For information on the operations, which you can perform with the file module, see the below Functions.