Using pathlib/os.path etc correctly

Question

I was wondering how to use the os.path and pathlib correctly. I'm supposed to search for a directory(which I already did) and then after that enter a letter and space and it will decide what it will do.

import os import os.path import shutil from pathlib import Path

def search_files():
    directory = input()
    exist = Path(directory)
    if exist.exists():
        return directory
    else:
        print("Error")
        print("Try again: ")
        return search_files()





def search_characteristics(directory):
    interesting = input()
    exist = os.path.exists(directory)
    if interesting[0] == 'N':
        return os.path.join(directory, interesting)
    else:
        print("Error")
        return search_characteristics()



if __name__ == '__main__':
    directory = input()
    search_files()
    search_characteristics(directory)

For this as you can see, search_files looks for a directory which works. The next part is the one where I'm confused. Basically after it searches for a directory, C:\\Program Files or something, I would enter N in the new line to search for what I want in the directory.

Say like

C:\\Users\\Desktop\\stuff

N something.txt

The N would look for the exact name of the file.

Am I doing it correctly or is there another way to do it?

Answer 1

This script will do what you want. Along with using the result of your directory search function for the next call, I also changed the compare to use .startswith so that a emtpy string response doesn't crash the program.

import os
from pathlib import *

def search_files():
    directory = input()
    exist = Path(directory)
    if exist.exists():
        return directory
    else:
        print("Error")
        print("Try again: ")
        return search_files()


def search_characteristics(directory):
    interesting = input()
    exist = os.path.exists(directory)
    if interesting.startswith('N'):
        return os.path.join(directory, interesting)
    else:
        print("Error")
        return search_characteristics(directory)

if __name__ == '__main__':
    directory = search_files()
    fn = search_characteristics(directory)
    print(fn)