How to work with ZIP files in Python
Learn ZIP file manipulation with the zipfile module.
ZIP format is commonly used as a file archival as well as compression format which is supported across all platforms. Files can be compressed without losing any data. Python has built-in support for ZIP files.
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In this article, we will learn how ZIP files can be read, written, extracted, and listed in Python.
List ZIP file contents¶
The zipfile module in Python, a part of the built-in libraries, can be used to manipulate ZIP files. It is advised to work with file handlers inside a context manager as it takes care of file pointer closure.
To read a ZIP file we first create an instance of the ZipFile class and use the following methods to get file information:
import zipfile
with zipfile.ZipFile("./data.zip") as zip:
print("As table:")
print(zip.printdir()) # display files and folders in tabular format
print("\nAs list:")
print(zip.namelist()) # list of files and folders
print("\nAs list of objects:")
print(zip.infolist()) # get files as ZipInfo objects
Output:
As table:
File Name Modified Size
data/ 2022-04-24 19:00:16 0
data/assets/ 2022-04-24 19:00:24 0
data/assets/index.txt 2022-04-24 19:01:12 11
data/configurations.txt 2022-04-24 18:52:26 0
data/sample.txt 2022-04-24 18:52:16 0
As list:
['data/', 'data/assets/', 'data/assets/index.txt', 'data/configurations.txt', 'data/sample.txt']
As list of objects:
[<ZipInfo filename='data/' external_attr=0x10>, <ZipInfo filename='data/assets/' external_attr=0x10>, <ZipInfo filename='data/assets/index.txt' compress_type=deflate external_attr=0x20 file_size=11 compress_size=13>, <ZipInfo filename='data/configurations.txt' external_attr=0x20 file_size=0>, <ZipInfo filename='data/sample.txt' external_attr=0x20 file_size=0>]
Read specific files from ZIP¶
After a ZIP file is read, use the open() method to read a specific file.
import zipfile
with zipfile.ZipFile("./data.zip") as zip:
with zip.open("data/assets/index.txt") as fp:
print(fp.read().decode())
Output:
hello-world
Adding files to a ZIP¶
To add files we first open the ZIP file in append mode. It is important not to open it in write mode because then the entire ZIP will be overwritten!
import zipfile
with zipfile.ZipFile("./data.zip", "a") as zip:
zip.write("app.py", arcname="python/app.py")
arcname is used to define the path of file inside the ZIP. Extracting the contents¶
Extraction is pretty simple. For this the file needs to be opened in read mode:
import zipfile
with zipfile.ZipFile("./data.zip", "a") as zip:
zip.extractall() # extract data into current working directory
Extracting password protected ZIP:
import zipfile
with zipfile.ZipFile("./data.zip", "a") as zip:
zip.extractall(pwd=bytes(pswd, 'utf-8'))
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