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# `filecmp` — File and Directory Comparisons

The `filecmp` module defines functions to compare files and directories, with various optional time/correctness trade-offs. For comparing files, see also the `difflib` module.

The `filecmp` module defines the following functions:

`filecmp.``cmp`(f1, f2[, shallow])

  Compare the files named f1 and f2, returning `True` if they seem equal, `False` otherwise.

  Unless shallow is given and is false, files with identical `os.stat()` signatures are taken to be equal.

  Files that were compared using this function will not be compared again unless their `os.stat()` signature changes.

  Note that no external programs are called from this function, giving it portability and efficiency.

`filecmp.``cmpfiles`(dir1, dir2, common[, shallow])

  Returns three lists of file names: match, mismatch, errors. match contains the list of files match in both directories, mismatch includes the names of those that don’t, and errros lists the names of files which could not be compared. Files may be listed in errors because the user may lack permission to read them or many other reasons, but always that the comparison could not be done for some reason.

  The common parameter is a list of file names found in both directories. The shallow parameter has the same meaning and default value as for `filecmp.cmp()`.

Example:

    >>> import filecmp
    >>> filecmp.cmp('undoc.rst', 'undoc.rst')
    True
    >>> filecmp.cmp('undoc.rst', 'index.rst')
    False

## The `dircmp` class

`dircmp` instances are built using this constructor:

class `filecmp.``dircmp`(a, b[, ignore[, hide]])

  Construct a new directory comparison object, to compare the directories a and b. ignore is a list of names to ignore, and defaults to `['RCS', 'CVS', 'tags']`. hide is a list of names to hide, and defaults to `[os.curdir, os.pardir]`.

  The `dircmp` class provides the following methods:

  `report`()
    Print (to `sys.stdout`) a comparison between a and b.
  `report_partial_closure`()
    Print a comparison between a and b and common immediate subdirectories.
  `report_full_closure`()
    Print a comparison between a and b and common subdirectories (recursively).

  The `dircmp` offers a number of interesting attributes that may be used to get various bits of information about the directory trees being compared.

  Note that via `__getattr__()` hooks, all attributes are computed lazily, so there is no speed penalty if only those attributes which are lightweight to compute are used.

  `left_list`
    Files and subdirectories in a, filtered by hide and ignore.
  `right_list`
    Files and subdirectories in b, filtered by hide and ignore.
  `common`
    Files and subdirectories in both a and b.
  `left_only`
    Files and subdirectories only in a.
  `right_only`
    Files and subdirectories only in b.
  `common_dirs`
    Subdirectories in both a and b.
  `common_files`
    Files in both a and b
  `common_funny`
    Names in both a and b, such that the type differs between the directories, or names for which `os.stat()` reports an error.
  `same_files`
    Files which are identical in both a and b.
  `diff_files`
    Files which are in both a and b, whose contents differ.
  `funny_files`
    Files which are in both a and b, but could not be compared.
  `subdirs`
    A dictionary mapping names in `common_dirs` to `dircmp` objects.

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