Reference: File Handling

Quick-lookup pages. Short, dense, and designed to skim — the sort of thing you keep a tab open on while you're coding. If you're here to learn the topic for the first time, start with Learn instead.

Pages in this section

• open() function reference — every parameter, what it does, and the safe defaults.
• File modes reference — r, w, a, x, b, t, +, and the combinations that actually make sense.
• pathlib quick reference — Path methods at a glance: building, inspecting, manipulating.