Python Error in Canopy but not in IDLE

Question

I have this simple script that attaches a text file to an email in Python. When I run this script in IDLE it works fine. When I run it in Canopy Express however, I get this error: (The text.txt file is in the same directory as the python script)

---------------------------------------------------------------------------
IOError                                   Traceback (most recent call last)
C:\Program Files (x86)\Enthought\Canopy32\App\appdata\canopy-1.2.0.1610.win-x86\lib\site-packages\IPython\utils\py3compat.pyc in execfile(fname, glob, loc)
    195             else:
    196                 filename = fname
--> 197             exec compile(scripttext, filename, 'exec') in glob, loc
    198     else:
    199         def execfile(fname, *where):

C:\Users\499293\Desktop\Project Folder\attachex.py in <module>()
      7 
      8 # Read a file and encode it into base64 format
----> 9 fo = open(filename, "rb")
     10 filecontent = fo.read()
     11 encodedcontent = base64.b64encode(filecontent)  # base64

IOError: [Errno 2] No such file or directory: 'text.txt' 

This is the code I am using:

#!/usr/bin/python

import smtplib
import base64

filename = "text.txt"

# Read a file and encode it into base64 format
fo = open(filename, "rb")
filecontent = fo.read()
encodedcontent = base64.b64encode(filecontent)  # base64

sender = 'me@work.com'
reciever = 'them@work.com'

marker = "AUNIQUEMARKER"

body ="""
This is a test email to send an attachement.
"""
# Define the main headers.
part1 = """From: From Person <me@fromdomain.net>
To: To Person <amrood.admin@gmail.com>
Subject: Sending Attachement
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: multipart/mixed; boundary=%s
--%s
""" % (marker, marker)

# Define the message action
part2 = """Content-Type: text/plain
Content-Transfer-Encoding:8bit

%s
--%s
""" % (body,marker)

# Define the attachment section
part3 = """Content-Type: multipart/mixed; name=\"%s\"
Content-Transfer-Encoding:base64
Content-Disposition: attachment; filename=%s

%s
--%s--
""" %(filename, filename, encodedcontent, marker)
message = part1 + part2 + part3

try:
   smtpObj = smtplib.SMTP('mailhost.work.com', 25)
   smtpObj.sendmail(sender, reciever, message)
   print "Successfully sent email"
except Exception:
   print "Error: unable to send email"

I don't really understand what the error means or why I am getting it using Canopy but not IDLE. (I just downloaded Canopy to take advantage of the built in matplotlib and numpy)

Answer 1

The fact that the file is in the same directory is not relevant - it has to be in the current working directory - iow the directory you're in when launching the script. Else you either need to pass the file's path as argument or compute a path from the script's location (which you can get from the __file__ magic variable).

Answer 2

What Bruno said.

Also:

At the upper right of Canopy's Python pane is a drop down menu. You can use this to set the current working directory to match the directory of your Python file (or, indeed to always sync to the directory of the open python file). This would be a simple workaround for the assumptions that your code is making.

This feature can be useful for beginners, though is not usually what an experienced developer will want.