Get Parent Directory of Running Script

Get parent directory of running script

If your script is located in /var/www/dir/index.php then the following would return:

dirname(__FILE__); // /var/www/dir

or

dirname( dirname(__FILE__) ); // /var/www

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Edit

This is a technique used in many frameworks to determine relative paths from the app_root.

File structure:

 /var/
      www/
          index.php
          subdir/
                 library.php

index.php is my dispatcher/boostrap file that all requests are routed to:

define(ROOT_PATH, dirname(__FILE__) ); // /var/www

library.php is some file located an extra directory down and I need to determine the path relative to the app root (/var/www/).

$path_current = dirname( __FILE__ ); // /var/www/subdir
$path_relative = str_replace(ROOT_PATH, '', $path_current); // /subdir

There's probably a better way to calculate the relative path then str_replace() but you get the idea.

Retrieve parent directory of script

How about using dirname twice?

APP_ROOT="$(dirname "$(dirname "$(readlink -fm "$0")")")"

The quoting desaster is only necessary to guard against whitespace in paths. Otherwise it would be more pleasing to the eye:

APP_ROOT=$(dirname $(dirname $(readlink -fm $0)))

Get parent of current directory from Python script

Using os.path

To get the parent directory of the directory containing the script (regardless of the current working directory), you'll need to use __file__.

Inside the script use os.path.abspath(__file__) to obtain the absolute path of the script, and call os.path.dirname twice:

from os.path import dirname, abspath
d = dirname(dirname(abspath(__file__))) # /home/kristina/desire-directory

Basically, you can walk up the directory tree by calling os.path.dirname as many times as needed. Example:

In [4]: from os.path import dirname

In [5]: dirname('/home/kristina/desire-directory/scripts/script.py')
Out[5]: '/home/kristina/desire-directory/scripts'

In [6]: dirname(dirname('/home/kristina/desire-directory/scripts/script.py'))
Out[6]: '/home/kristina/desire-directory'

If you want to get the parent directory of the current working directory, use os.getcwd:

import os
d = os.path.dirname(os.getcwd())

Using pathlib

You could also use the pathlib module (available in Python 3.4 or newer).

Each pathlib.Path instance have the parent attribute referring to the parent directory, as well as the parents attribute, which is a list of ancestors of the path. Path.resolve may be used to obtain the absolute path. It also resolves all symlinks, but you may use Path.absolute instead if that isn't a desired behaviour.

Path(__file__) and Path() represent the script path and the current working directory respectively, therefore in order to get the parent directory of the script directory (regardless of the current working directory) you would use

from pathlib import Path
# `path.parents[1]` is the same as `path.parent.parent`
d = Path(__file__).resolve().parents[1] # Path('/home/kristina/desire-directory')

and to get the parent directory of the current working directory

from pathlib import Path
d = Path().resolve().parent

Note that d is a Path instance, which isn't always handy. You can convert it to str easily when you need it:

In [15]: str(d)
Out[15]: '/home/kristina/desire-directory'

How do I get the parent directory in Python?

Python 3.4

Use the pathlib module.

from pathlib import Path
path = Path("/here/your/path/file.txt")
print(path.parent.absolute())

Old answer

Try this:

import os
print os.path.abspath(os.path.join(yourpath, os.pardir))

where yourpath is the path you want the parent for.

Get parent directory of shell script's directory

Run dirname twice (nested).

~$ dirname $PWD
/home
~$ dirname `dirname $PWD`
/
~$ 

Getting the parent of a directory in Bash

dir=/home/smith/Desktop/Test
parentdir="$(dirname "$dir")"

Works if there is a trailing slash, too.

How to get the Parent's parent directory in Powershell?

Version for a directory

get-item is your friendly helping hand here.

(get-item $scriptPath ).parent.parent

If you Want the string only

(get-item $scriptPath ).parent.parent.FullName

Version for a file

If $scriptPath points to a file then you have to call Directory property on it first, so the call would look like this

(get-item $scriptPath).Directory.Parent.Parent.FullName

Remarks
This will only work if $scriptPath exists. Otherwise you have to use Split-Path cmdlet.

Get Parent directory of a specific path in batch script

do not use variable PATH for this. %PATH% is a built-in variable used by the command prompt.

@echo off
set "_path=C:\SecondParent\FirstParent\testfile.ini"
for %%a in ("%_path%") do set "p_dir=%%~dpa"
echo %p_dir%
for %%a in (%p_dir:~0,-1%) do set "p2_dir=%%~dpa"
echo %p2_dir%

How to extract the parent folder in bash script?

Like this, using pre-defined variable PWD:

value="$PWD"
echo "you are here :$value"
echo "the folder is: ${value##*/}"
echo "the parent folder is $(basename "${PWD%/*}")"

You can replace the last line with:

dir="${PWD%/*}"
echo "the parent folder is ${dir##*/}"

The backquote (`) is used in the old-style command substitution, e.g.

foo=`command`

The foo=$(command) syntax is recommended instead. Backslash handling inside $() is less surprising, and $() is easier to nest. See http://mywiki.wooledge.org/BashFAQ/082

How to get just the name of the parent folder in the directory where a script is running in php?

The simplest way to do it:

basename(__DIR__);

As @mario sagely noted, this is only possible with PHP 5.3+, so if you're stuck with 5.2 or less ... well ... you should switch to a new host and stop using legacy software.

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