File and Directory Entries API

The File and Directory Entries API simulates a local file system that web apps can navigate within and access files in. You can develop apps which read, write, and create files and/or directories in a virtual, sandboxed file system.

Two very similar APIs exist depending on whether you desire asynchronous or synchronous behavior. The synchronous API is intended to be used inside a Worker and will return the values you desire. The asynchronous API will not block and functions and the API will not return values; instead, you will need to supply a callback function to handle the response whenever it arrives.

Getting access to a file system

There are two ways to get access to file systems defined in the current specification draft:

• When handling a drop event for drag and drop, you can call DataTransferItem.webkitGetAsEntry() to get the FileSystemEntry for a dropped item. If the result isn't null, then it's a dropped file or directory, and you can use file system calls to work with it.
• The HTMLInputElement.webkitEntries property lets you access the FileSystemFileEntry objects for the currently selected files, but only if they are dragged-and-dropped onto the file chooser (bug 1326031). If HTMLInputElement.webkitdirectory is true, the <input> element is instead a directory picker, and you get FileSystemDirectoryEntry objects for each selected directory.

Asynchronous API

The asynchronous API should be used for most operations, to prevent file system accesses from blocking the entire browser if used on the main thread. It includes the following interfaces:

FileSystem

Represents a file system.

FileSystemEntry

The basic interface representing a single entry in a file system. This is implemented by other interfaces which represent files or directories.

FileSystemFileEntry

Represents a single file in a file system.

FileSystemDirectoryEntry

Represents a single directory in a file system.

FileSystemDirectoryReader

Created by calling FileSystemDirectoryEntry.createReader(), this interface provides the functionality which lets you read the contents of a directory.

FileSystemFlags

Defines a set of values which are used when specifying option flags when calling certain methods in the File and Directory Entries API.

FileError

Represents an error which is generated by asynchronous file system calls.

There are also two global functions (which are not part of the specification at this time and are implemented only by Google Chrome). They're available on the Window object and implemented in LocalFileSystem: requestFileSystem() and resolveLocalFileSystemURL().

Synchronous API

The synchronous API is should only be used in Workers; these calls block until they're finished executing, and simply return the results instead of using callbacks. Using them on the main thread will block the browser, which is naughty. The interfaces below otherwise mirror the ones from the asynchronous API.

FileSystemSync

Represents a file system.

FileSystemEntrySync

The basic interface representing a single entry in a file system. This is implemented by other interfaces which represent files or directories.

FileSystemFileEntrySync

Represents a single file in a file system.

FileSystemDirectoryEntrySync

Represents a single directory in a file system.

FileSystemDirectoryReaderSync

Created by calling FileSystemDirectoryEntrySync.createReader(), this interface provides the functionality which lets you read the contents of a directory.

FileException

Represents an error which is generated by synchronous file system calls.

There are also two global functions (which are not part of the specification at this time and are implemented only by Google Chrome). They're available on the Worker object and implemented in LocalFileSystemSync: requestFileSystemSync() and resolveLocalFileSystemSyncURL().

Other Interfaces

LocalFileSystem

Gives you access to a sandboxed file system.

LocalFileSystemSync

LockedFile

Provides tools to deal with a given file with all the necessary locks.

Metadata

Specifications

This API has no official W3C or WHATWG specification.

Browser compatibility

See also

• Introduction to the File and Directory Entries API
• File and Directory Entries API support in Firefox