Filename reading on PHP

Question

Im trying to read filenames from a directory using the code and adding a filter to readonly files with the current year and month in the filename for example

Julius Robles_Client11_20130508_10-42-42_AM.zip
Julius Robles_Client12_20130508_11-45-42_AM.zip
Julius Robles_Client13_20130508_11-58-42_AM.zip

so the code will only return files with 201305 in their names but it returns a correct filtered set but some files are missing and i dont know why?

also what is the file "." and ".." stored in the first 2 rows of the array?

heres the code

$filenames = array();
if ($handle = opendir('archive/search_logs/')) {
  $ctr = 0;
  while (false !== ($entry = readdir($handle))) {
    //if(strpos($entry,date('Ym')) !== false){
    $name = $entry;
    $entry = str_replace("-",":",$entry);
    $filenames[$ctr] = explode("_", $entry);
    $filenames[$ctr][] = $name;
    $ctr++;
  //}
}
  closedir($handle);
}

Answer 1

why scandir? Use DirectoryIterator don't be affraid to use modern PHP

from manual:

The DirectoryIterator class provides a simple interface for viewing the contents of filesystem directories.

example:

<?php
$filenames = array();
$iterator = new DirectoryIterator($directory);
foreach ($iterator as $fileinfo) {
    if ($fileinfo->isFile()) {
        $filenames[] = $fileinfo->getFilename();
    }
}
print_r($filenames);

?>

with DirectoryIterator you can check $fileInfo via this methods:

• DirectoryIterator::isDir — Determine if current DirectoryIterator item is a directory
• DirectoryIterator::isDot — Determine if current DirectoryIterator item is '.' or '..'
• DirectoryIterator::isExecutable — Determine if current DirectoryIterator item is executable
• DirectoryIterator::isFile — Determine if current DirectoryIterator item is a regular file
• DirectoryIterator::isLink — Determine if current DirectoryIterator item is a symbolic link
• DirectoryIterator::isReadable — Determine if current DirectoryIterator item can be read
• DirectoryIterator::isWritable — Determine if current DirectoryIterator item can be written

Answer 2

As said in the comment:

. is the current directory .. is the directory above this one

You can skip both for reading the directory.

What I would personally do is read the filename and information based on a regular expression like so:

$filenames      = array();

foreach( scandir( 'archive/search_logs/' ) as $file ) {
    // test for current or higher path
    if( $file == "." || $file == ".." ) continue;
    // test if readable
    if( !is_readable( $file )) printf( "File %s is not readable",$file);
    // use regular expression to match: <filename><date:yyyymmdd>_<hours:hh>-<minutes:mm>-<seconds:ss>_<am|pm>.zip
    preg_match( "/(?<filename>[.]+)(?<date>[0-9]{8})\_(?<hours>[0-9]{2})\-(?<minutes>[0-9]{2})\-(?<seconds>[0-9]{2})\_(?<ampm>AM|PM)\.zip$/i" , $file , $matches );
    // now use anything in matches that suits your needs:
    echo $matches['filename'];
    echo $matches['date'];
    echo $matches['hours'];
    echo $matches['seconds'];
    echo $matches['ampm'];
}

This is untested and I might have overdone escaping the regular expression - and _.

---

As to your question why the file might not be available, I guess that question belongs to Server Fault. However you can test files for their rights with fileperms(http://www.php.net/manual/en/function.fileperms.php), however that will not provide results when they aren't readable in the first place.