SyntaxError when trying to use backslash for Windows file path

Question

I tried to confirm if a file exists using the following line of code:

os.path.isfile()

But I noticed if back slash is used by copy&past

Answer 1

You get the problem with the 2 character sequences \x and \U -- which are python escape codes. They tell python to interpret the data that comes after them in a special way (The former inserts bytes and the latter unicode). You can get around it by using a "raw" string:

os.path.isfile(r"C:\Users\xxx\Desktop\xxx")

or by using forward slashes (as, IIRC, windows will accept either one).