Welcome, guest | Sign In | My Account | Store | Cart

Recipe 498202 revision 1 

import re

def QuoteForPOSIX(string):
    '''quote a string so it can be used as an argument in a  posix shell

       According to: http://www.unix.org/single_unix_specification/
          2.2.1 Escape Character (Backslash)

          A backslash that is not quoted shall preserve the literal value
          of the following character, with the exception of a <newline>.

          2.2.2 Single-Quotes

          Enclosing characters in single-quotes ( '' ) shall preserve
          the literal value of each character within the single-quotes.
          A single-quote cannot occur within single-quotes.

    '''

    return "\\'".join("'" + p + "'" for p in string.split("'"))

if __name__ == "__main__":
    import os

    filename = "filename with spaces.doc"
    os.system("ls " + QuoteForPOSIX(filename))

History