How do you get a list of the names of all files present in a directory in Node.js?

Question

I\'m trying to get a list of the names of all the files present in a directory using Node.js. I want output that is an array of filenames. How can I do this?

Answer 1

I'm assuming from your question that you don't want directories names, just files.

Directory Structure Example

animals
├── all.jpg
├── mammals
│   └── cat.jpg
│   └── dog.jpg
└── insects
    └── bee.jpg

Walk function

Credits go to Justin Maier in this gist

If you want just an array of the files paths use return_object: false:

const fs = require('fs').promises;
const path = require('path');

async function walk(dir) {
    let files = await fs.readdir(dir);
    files = await Promise.all(files.map(async file => {
        const filePath = path.join(dir, file);
        const stats = await fs.stat(filePath);
        if (stats.isDirectory()) return walk(filePath);
        else if(stats.isFile()) return filePath;
    }));

    return files.reduce((all, folderContents) => all.concat(folderContents), []);
}

Usage

async function main() {
   console.log(await walk('animals'))
}

Output

[
  "/animals/all.jpg",
  "/animals/mammals/cat.jpg",
  "/animals/mammals/dog.jpg",
  "/animals/insects/bee.jpg"
];