How can I move files to a specific folder using only the first 4 letters

July 19, 2022

I am currently doing an apprenticeship as an IT specialist and only have to move files in Python to a specific folder based on the first 4 letters. All letters and numbers after the first 4 digits must be ignored. I hope you can help me here. The files have different extensions, e.g. .txt, .bat, .doc

import os
import shutil
from glob import glob


    
file_source = r'C:\Users\SHall\OneDrive\Desktop\Test'
file_destination = r'D:\BTLD'

get_files = os.listdir(file_source)

for BLTD*.txt in get_files:
    os.replace(file_source,file_destination)
    shutil.move(source,destination)

>Solution :

This should do what you need. I’m using pathlib for path manipulation instead of os and glob (same thing really).

import pathlib
import shutil
source_dir = pathlib.Path('./path/to/source')
target_dir = pathlib.Path('./path/to/target')
for p in source_dir.glob('BTLD*.*'):
    shutil.move(p, target_dir / p.name)