Move & Copy Files In NodeJS (Simple Examples)

Welcome to a tutorial on how to move and copy files in NodeJS. Need to back up some files in NodeJS? Move some old files to another folder?

That covers the quick basics, but read on if you need more examples!

 

 

TABLE OF CONTENTS

 

 

EXAMPLE CODE DOWNLOAD

Source code on GitHub Gist

Just click on “download zip” or do a git clone. I have released it under the MIT license, so feel free to build on top of it or use it in your own project.

 

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1) COPY FILES

// (A) FILE SYSTEM MODULE
const fs = require("fs"),
      source = "./SOURCE.txt",
      target = "./TARGET.txt";

// (B) COPY SYNC
try {
  fs.copyFileSync(source, target);
  console.log(`Copied ${source} to ${target}`);
} catch (err) {
  console.log("Error copying file");
}

// (C) COPY ASYNC
fs.copyFile(source, target, err => {
  if (err) { console.log(err); }
  else { console.log(`Copied ${source} to ${target}`); }
});

This should be self-explanatory, we use copyFile() or copyFileSync() to copy files. Simple.

 

2) MOVE FILES

// (A) FILE SYSTEM MODULE
const fs = require("fs"),
      source = "./SOURCE.txt",
      target = "./FOLDER/TARGET.txt";

// (B) MOVE SYNC
try {
  fs.renameSync(source, target);
  console.log(`Moved ${source} to ${target}`);
} catch (err) {
  console.log("Error copying file");
}

// (C) MOVE ASYNC
fs.rename(source, target, err => {
  if (err) { console.log(err); }
  else { console.log(`Moved ${source} to ${target}`); }
});

Yep, there’s no such thing as moveFile() in Node. We simply rename() the file to move it.

 

 

3) RECURSIVE COPY THE ENTIRE FOLDER

// (A) FS-EXTRA MODULE
// npm install fs-extra
// https://www.npmjs.com/package/fs-extra
const fse = require("fs-extra");

// (B) COPY
try {
  fse.copySync("./SOURCE/", "./TARGET/");
  console.log("COPY OK");
} catch (err) {
  console.log(err);
}

NodeJS does not have a native “copy all” function. So to copy an entire folder recursively, the easiest way is to use a module such as fs-extra – fse.copySync("SOURCE", "DESTINATION") and that’s it.

P.S. To move the entire folder, there is a corresponding moveSync().

 

4) COPY FILES WITH EXTENSION

// (A) LOAD MODULES
const path = require("path"),
      fs = require("fs");

// (B) SOURCE & TARGET FOLDERS
const source = path.join(__dirname, "SOURCE/"),
      target = path.join(__dirname, "TARGET/"),
      ext = ".txt";

// (C) LOOP THROUGH FILES
fs.readdirSync(source).forEach((file) => {
  if (path.extname(file).toLowerCase() == ext) {
    fs.copyFileSync(source + file, target + file);
    console.log(`Copied ${source + file} to ${target + file}`);
  }
});

To copy files of a certain extension – A common way is to loop through all the files, check the file extension, then only copy those that match.

 

 

 

LINKS & REFERENCES

• Copy File | Copy File Sync – NodeJS
• Rename | Rename Sync – NodeJS