Golang : How to check if a file is hidden?
So, how to check if a file is hidden? The solutions below are OS dependent. One for Unix/Linux and another for Windows. It is pretty straightforward to check if a file is hidden under Linux/Unix, but more complicated under Windows.
For Linux/Unix:
package main
import (
"fmt"
"log"
"os"
"runtime"
)
func IsHidden(filename string) (bool, error) {
if runtime.GOOS != "windows" {
// unix/linux file or directory that starts with . is hidden
if filename[0:1] == "." {
return true, nil
} else {
return false, nil
}
} else {
log.Fatal("Unable to check if file is hidden under this OS")
}
return false, nil
}
func main() {
if len(os.Args) != 2 {
fmt.Printf("Usage : %s <filename>\n", os.Args[0])
os.Exit(0)
}
filename := os.Args[1]
result, err := IsHidden(filename)
if err != nil {
log.Println(err)
}
log.Println("["+filename+"]", "is hidden? ", result)
}
Sample output:
$ ./fileishidden .vscode
2017/04/26 10:35:10 .vscode is hidden? true
$ ./fileishidden work
2017/04/26 10:35:58 [work] is hidden? false
$ ./fileishidden .themes
2017/04/26 10:36:03 [.themes] is hidden? true
NOTE: I'd tried to build a cross-platform solution, but compiling the code below under Linux will generate these errors:
# command-line-arguments
./fileishiddenwindows.go:18: undefined: syscall.UTF16PtrFromString
./fileishiddenwindows.go:22: undefined: syscall.GetFileAttributes
./fileishiddenwindows.go:26: undefined: syscall.FILE_ATTRIBUTE_HIDDEN
However, everything is fine when compiling under Windows. Somehow, the Windows related functions are not available under Linux. Maybe changing the target platform will be helpful.
For Windows:
package main
import (
// use golang.org/x/sys/windows package in case syscall package has missing
// GetFileAttributes
//"golang.org/x/sys/windows"
"fmt"
"log"
"os"
"runtime"
"syscall"
)
func IsHidden(filename string) (bool, error) {
if runtime.GOOS == "windows" {
pointer, err := syscall.UTF16PtrFromString(filename)
if err != nil {
return false, err
}
attributes, err := syscall.GetFileAttributes(pointer)
if err != nil {
return false, err
}
return attributes&syscall.FILE_ATTRIBUTE_HIDDEN != 0, nil
} else {
log.Fatal("Unable to invoke GetFileAttributes() function or FILE_ATTRIBUTE_HIDDEN property")
}
return false, nil
}
func main() {
if len(os.Args) != 2 {
fmt.Printf("Usage : %s <filename>\n", os.Args[0])
os.Exit(0)
}
filename := os.Args[1]
result, err := IsHidden(filename)
if err != nil {
log.Println(err)
}
log.Println(filename, "is hidden? ", result)
}
Sample output:
References:
https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/aa364944(v=vs.85).aspx
See also : Golang : Test file read write permission example
By Adam Ng
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