How to copy files using subprocess in python? - python-2.7

Question

I have a list of files:
file_list=['test1.txt','test2.txt','test3.txt']
I want to find and copy these files to a destination folder. I have the following code:
for files in file_list:
subprocess.call(["find", "test_folder/",
"-iname", files,
"-exec", "cp", "{}",
"dest_folder/",
"\;"])
But, i keep getting the error:
find: missing argument to `-exec
The shell command looks something like this:
$find test_folder/ -iname 'test1.txt' -exec cp {} dest_folder/ \;
Anything i am doing wrong?

Answer 1

You don't need to escape semi-colon. Here's what is working for me:
import shlex
import subprocess
file_list = ['test1.txt','test2.txt','test3.txt']
cmd = 'find test_folder -iname %s -exec cp {} dest_folder ;'
for files in file_list:
subprocess.Popen(shlex.split(cmd % files))
Also see:
Python equivilant to find -exec
find command with exec in python subprocess gives error
Hope that helps.

Answer 2

You don't need to escape the arguments; subprocess module calls find command directly without the shell. Replace "\;" with ";" and your command will work as is.
You could combine the search into a single command:
from subprocess import call
expr = [a for file in file_list for a in ['-iname', file, '-o']]
expr.pop() # remove last `-o`
rc = call(["find", "test_folder/", "("] + expr + [")", "-exec",
"cp", "-t", "dest_folder/", "--", "{}", "+"])
You could also combine expr list into a single -iregex argument if desired.
You don't need find command; you could implement the copying in pure Python using os.walk, re.match, and shutil.copy:
import os
import re
import shutil
found = re.compile('(?i)^(?:%s)$' % '|'.join(map(re.escape, file_list))).match
for root, dirs, files in os.walk('test_folder/'):
for filename in files:
if found(filename):
shutil.copy(os.path.join(root, filename), "dest_folder/")