    dirname $file

is what you are looking for

    dirname $file

will output 

    stuff/backup

which is the opposite of `basename`:

    basename $file

would output

    file.zip

Using `${file%/*}` like suggested by Urvin/LuFFy is technically better since you won&#39;t rely on an external command. To get the basename in the same way you could do `${file##*/}`. It&#39;s unnecessary to use an external command unless you need to.

    file=&quot;/stuff/backup/file.zip&quot;
    filename=${1##*/}     # file.zip
    directory=${1%/*}     # /stuff/backup

It would also be fully POSIX compliant this way. Hope it helps! :-)

For getting `directorypath` from the `filepath`:

    file=&quot;stuff/backup/file.zip&quot;
    dirPath=${file%/*}/
    echo ${dirPath}

Simply use `$ dirname /home/~username/stuff/backup/file.zip`

It will return `/home/~username/stuff/backup/`

I&#39;m trying to get the program to give me a beeping noise. I&#39;m on a windows machine. I&#39;ve looked at http://docs.python.org/library/winsound.html


  [1]: http://docs.python.org/library/winsound.html

But not sure how I can program this with a barcode scanner. 

Here is my code for the serial barcode scanner. 

    ser = serial.Serial()
    ser.baudrate = 9600
    
    #for windows
    ser.port = 2 #for COM3
    
    ser.open()
    ser.write(&#39;hello&#39;)
    ser.close()

UPDATE: Since I&#39;m annoying my co-workers with the beep. Can I get it to come through the audio jack for headphones?

Python: Making a beep noise

How can I draw a line between two or more elements to connect them? Any combination of HTML/CSS/JavaScript/SVG/Canvas is fine.

If your answer supports any of these, then do mention it:

- draggable elements
- draggable/editable connections
- element overlap avoidance

&gt; This question has been updated to [consolidate the numerous variations](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/linked/6278152) of it.

Draw a connecting line between two elements

In my script I need the **directory** of the file I am working with.  For example, the *file*=**&quot;stuff/backup/file.zip&quot;**. I need a way to get the string &quot;**stuff/backup/**&quot; from the variable `$file`. 



Extract directory from path

In my script I need the directory of the file I am working with. For example, the file="stuff/backup/file.zip". I need a way to get the string "stuff/backup/" from the variable <code>$file</code>.

I have a string 

    String startDate = &quot;06/27/2007&quot;;

now i have to get Date object. My DateObject should be the same value as of startDate.

I am doing like this
    
    DateFormat df = new SimpleDateFormat(&quot;mm/dd/yyyy&quot;);
    Date startDate = df.parse(startDate);

But the output is in format 

&gt;Jan 27 00:06:00 PST 2007. 

how to convert java string to Date object

I am searching for the shortest way (in code) to initialize list of strings and array of strings, i.e. list/array containing 
&quot;s1&quot;, &quot;s2&quot;, &quot;s3&quot; string elements.



What is the shortest way to initialize List of strings in java?

How does `StringBuilder` work? 

What does it do *internally*? Does it use unsafe code? 
And why is it so fast (compared to the `+` operator)?

How does StringBuilder work internally in C#?

I have something like this:

    extensionsToCheck = [&#39;.pdf&#39;, &#39;.doc&#39;, &#39;.xls&#39;]
    
    for extension in extensionsToCheck:
    	if extension in url_string:
    		print(url_string)

I am wondering what would be the more elegant way to do this in Python (without using the for loop)? I was thinking of something like this (like from C/C++), but it didn&#39;t work:

    if (&#39;.pdf&#39; or &#39;.doc&#39; or &#39;.xls&#39;) in url_string:
        print(url_string)


*Edit: I&#39;m kinda forced to explain how this is different to the question below which is marked as potential duplicate (so it doesn&#39;t get closed I guess).*  

*The difference is, I wanted to check if a string is part of some list of strings whereas the other question is checking whether a string from a list of strings is a substring of another string. Similar, but not quite the same and semantics matter when you&#39;re looking for an answer online IMHO. These two questions are actually looking to solve the opposite problem of one another. The solution for both turns out to be the same though.* 

How to check if a string contains an element from a list in Python

I have an integer that was generated from an `android.graphics.Color`

The Integer has a value of -16776961

How do I convert this value into a hex string with the format #RRGGBB

Simply put: I would like to output #0000FF from -16776961

**Note:** I do not want the output to contain an alpha and i have also tried [this example][1] without any success


  [1]: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/4506708/android-convert-color-int-to-hexa-string

How to convert a color integer to a hex String in Android?

Is there a way to effectively do this in bash:

    /my/bash/script &lt; echo &#39;This string will be sent to stdin.&#39;

I&#39;m aware that I could pipe the output from the echo such as this:

    echo &#39;This string will be piped to stdin.&#39; | /my/bash/script

Send string to stdin

I want to write in a bash script a piece of code that checks if a program is already running.
I have the following in order to search whether bar is running

     foo=`ps -ef | grep bar | grep -v grep`

The

     grep -v grep

part is to ensure that the &quot;grep bar&quot; is not taken into account in ps results

When bar isn&#39;t running, foo is correctly empty. But my problem lies in the fact tha the script has

     set -e

which is a flag to terminate the script if some command returns an error.
It turns out that when bar isn&#39;t running, &quot;grep -v grep&quot; doesn&#39;t match with anything and grep returns an error. I tried using -q or -s but to no avail.

Is there any solution to that? Thx

Prevent grep returning an error when input doesn&#39;t match

In a bash script, I need to determine whether an executable named `foo` is on the PATH.

Detect if executable file is on user&#39;s PATH

The following questions are meant for bash and linux only: 

1. Is there a limit on the number of characters in the absolute path name of a file?  
2. Is there a limit on the number of characters for the filename (without extension) only?  

If so, what might these limits be? How can I access them in case they are system specific? 

Limit on file name length in bash

I need to calculate md5sum of one string (pathfile) per line in my `ls` dump, `directory_listing_file`:

    ./r/g4/f1.JPG
    ./r/g4/f2.JPG
    ./r/g4/f3.JPG
    ./r/g4/f4.JPG

But that md5sum should be calculated  without the initial dot.
I&#39;ve written a simple script:

    while read line
    do
        echo $line | exec &#39;md5sum&#39;
    done

    ./g.sh &lt; directory_listnitg.txt

How do I remove the first dot from each line?

Remove first character of a string in Bash

Does anyone know how to add another folder to the asset pipeline in Rails 3.1?

I&#39;d like to serve `app/assets/fonts` the same way `app/assets/images` is served.

- - - - -
**Update: 5-7-2013**

Just to add some clarification for future people who find this question to explicitly add an asset path, in your application.rb file:

    config.assets.paths &lt;&lt; &quot;#{Rails.root}/app/assets/fonts&quot;

However, since the above path is under `app/assets` you don&#39;t have to add it explicitly, you just need to restart your rails app so Sprockets can pick it up.

You will have to explicitly add paths that are outside of `app/assets`,`lib/assets`, or `vendor/assets`, and just remember that while Sprockets picks up new files in folders that were present when your application loaded, in my experience it does not pick up new folders in the asset paths without a restart.

Add a new asset path in Rails 3.1

Basically, I know I can go through my control panel and modify the path variable. But, I&#39;m wondering if there is a way to through batch programming have a temporary path included? That way it is only used during that batch file execution. I don&#39;t want to have people go in and modify their path variables just to use my batch file.

How to add a set path only for that batch file executing?

For new applications written in Java 7, is there any reason to use a [`java.io.File`][2] object any more or can we consider it deprecated? 

I believe a [`java.nio.file.Path`][1] can do everything a [`java.io.File`][2] can do and more.


  [1]: http://download.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/api/java/nio/file/Path.html
  [2]: http://download.oracle.com/javase/7/docs/api/java/io/File.html

Java: Path vs File

I program in WPF C#.  I have e.g. the following path:
```
C:\Program Files\hello.txt
```
and I want to extract **`hello`** from it. 

The path is a `string` retrieved from a database.  Currently I&#39;m using the following code to split the path by `&#39;\&#39;` and then split again by `&#39;.&#39;`:
```c#
string path = &quot;C:\\Program Files\\hello.txt&quot;;
string[] pathArr = path.Split(&#39;\\&#39;);
string[] fileArr = pathArr.Last().Split(&#39;.&#39;);
string fileName = fileArr.Last().ToString();
```
It works, but I believe there should be shorter and smarter solution to that. Any idea?

Given a filesystem path, is there a shorter way to extract the filename without its extension?

I use Django but I need to find the default templates and applications.

I don&#39;t know where it&#39;s installed.

How can I find that?


Content Type	Original Author	Original Content on Stackoverflow
Question	Matt	View Question on Stackoverflow
Solution 1 - String	Matthieu	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 2 - String	matchew	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 3 - String	MageParts	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 4 - String	Urvin Shah	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 5 - String	Nishchay Sharma	View Answer on Stackoverflow

Extract directory from path

String Problem Overview

String Solutions

Solution 1 - String

Solution 2 - String

Solution 3 - String

Solution 4 - String

Solution 5 - String

Draw a connecting line between two elements

Python: Making a beep noise

Attributions