QTemporaryFile¶

The QTemporaryFile class is an I/O device that operates on temporary files. More…

Synopsis¶

Functions¶

def autoRemove ()
def fileTemplate ()
def open ()
def setAutoRemove (b)
def setFileTemplate (name)

Static functions¶

def createNativeFile (file)
def createNativeFile (fileName)

Detailed Description¶

QTemporaryFile is used to create unique temporary files safely. The file itself is created by calling open() . The name of the temporary file is guaranteed to be unique (i.e., you are guaranteed to not overwrite an existing file), and the file will subsequently be removed upon destruction of the QTemporaryFile object. This is an important technique that avoids data corruption for applications that store data in temporary files. The file name is either auto-generated, or created based on a template, which is passed to QTemporaryFile ‘s constructor.

Example:

# Within a function/method...
file = QTemporaryFile()
if (file.open()) {
    # file.fileName() returns the unique file name

# The QTemporaryFile destructor removes the temporary file
# as it goes out of scope.

Reopening a QTemporaryFile after calling close() is safe. For as long as the QTemporaryFile object itself is not destroyed, the unique temporary file will exist and be kept open internally by QTemporaryFile .

The file name of the temporary file can be found by calling fileName() . Note that this is only defined after the file is first opened; the function returns an empty string before this.

A temporary file will have some static part of the name and some part that is calculated to be unique. The default filename will be determined from applicationName() (otherwise qt_temp) and will be placed into the temporary path as returned by tempPath() . If you specify your own filename, a relative file path will not be placed in the temporary directory by default, but be relative to the current working directory.

Specified filenames can contain the following template XXXXXX (six upper case “X” characters), which will be replaced by the auto-generated portion of the filename. Note that the template is case sensitive. If the template is not present in the filename, QTemporaryFile appends the generated part to the filename given.

Note

On Linux, QTemporaryFile will attempt to create unnamed temporary files. If that succeeds, open() will return true but exists() will be false. If you call fileName() or any function that calls it, QTemporaryFile will give the file a name, so most applications will not see a difference.

See also

tempPath() QFile

class PySide6.QtCore.QTemporaryFile¶

PySide6.QtCore.QTemporaryFile(parent)

PySide6.QtCore.QTemporaryFile(templateName)

PySide6.QtCore.QTemporaryFile(templateName, parent)

Parameters

templateName – str
parent – PySide6.QtCore.QObject

Constructs a QTemporaryFile using as file template the application name returned by applicationName() (otherwise qt_temp) followed by “.XXXXXX”. The file is stored in the system’s temporary directory, tempPath() .

See also

setFileTemplate() tempPath()

Constructs a QTemporaryFile (with the given parent) using as file template the application name returned by applicationName() (otherwise qt_temp) followed by “.XXXXXX”. The file is stored in the system’s temporary directory, tempPath() .

See also

setFileTemplate()

Constructs a QTemporaryFile with a template filename of templateName. Upon opening the temporary file this will be used to create a unique filename.

If the templateName does not contain XXXXXX it will automatically be appended and used as the dynamic portion of the filename.

If templateName is a relative path, the path will be relative to the current working directory. You can use tempPath() to construct templateName if you want use the system’s temporary directory.

See also

open() fileTemplate()

Constructs a QTemporaryFile with a template filename of templateName and the specified parent. Upon opening the temporary file this will be used to create a unique filename.

If the templateName does not contain XXXXXX it will automatically be appended and used as the dynamic portion of the filename.

If templateName is a relative path, the path will be relative to the current working directory. You can use tempPath() to construct templateName if you want use the system’s temporary directory.

See also

open() fileTemplate()

PySide6.QtCore.QTemporaryFile.autoRemove()¶

Return type: bool

Returns true if the QTemporaryFile is in auto remove mode. Auto-remove mode will automatically delete the filename from disk upon destruction. This makes it very easy to create your QTemporaryFile object on the stack, fill it with data, read from it, and finally on function return it will automatically clean up after itself.

Auto-remove is on by default.

See also

setAutoRemove() remove()

static PySide6.QtCore.QTemporaryFile.createNativeFile(file)¶

Parameters: file – PySide6.QtCore.QFile
Return type: PySide6.QtCore.QTemporaryFile

If file is not already a native file, then a QTemporaryFile is created in tempPath() , the contents of file is copied into it, and a pointer to the temporary file is returned. Does nothing and returns 0 if file is already a native file.

For example:

f = QFile(":/resources/file.txt")
QTemporaryFile.createNativeFile(f) # Returns a pointer to a temporary file
f = QFile("/users/qt/file.txt")
QTemporaryFile.createNativeFile(f) # Returns 0

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