\input an unspecified file from a directory

Question

I would like to be able to input a file by stating only a directory name.

There would be a directory "mydir" containing several tex files, and I would like to be able to type:

\input{mydir}

and have some *.tex file selected and put into my document.

unless you use shell escape tex can not read the directory. So it is better to use ls (or dir on windows) to get a directory listing to a known file name and then read that with tex to input the files. — David Carlisle, Jun 15 '17 at 15:57
I'd be happy if any tex file could be inputed, merely by specifying the directory (with no knowledge of the name of the file in the directory) — Bart Snapp, Jun 15 '17 at 16:27
Since latex cannot read the contents of the dir, your probably better of having predictable file names and then looping over such a list combined with \InputIfFileExists. For instance naming the files myfileN.tex where N is a number, and knowing an upper limit to the number of files makes it easy to incluse also of those using a loop. — daleif, Jun 15 '17 at 16:52
@BartSnapp Any, some or all? You're not trying to explain yourself. — egreg, Jun 15 '17 at 17:07
Possible duplicate of Include/input every subfile from a subfolder. — GuM, Jun 15 '17 at 18:23
Possibly also duplicate of How to iterate through the name of files in a folder — Nicola Talbot, Jun 15 '17 at 20:22
@egreg I apologize for the confusion. "Any, some or all?" I'm looking to just to load "one" file. I don't care which one, but I'd rather not have to give it a predetermined name. — Bart Snapp, Jun 16 '17 at 14:02
@BartSnapp: Excuse me, but what does “I don’t care which one” means? Are you trying to select a random file from a given directory? — GuM, Jun 16 '17 at 14:39
@GustavoMezzetti Ah - it doesn't have to be "random" (but honestly it might as well be) — Bart Snapp, Jun 16 '17 at 15:54

score 3 · Answer 1 · answered Jun 15 '17 at 17:09

You can do that using LuaLaTeX:

\documentclass{article}

\usepackage[T1]{fontenc}
\usepackage{fontspec}
\usepackage{luacode}

\begin{luacode*}
    function input_dir(dir)
        local p = io.popen('find "./'..dir..'" -type f -name "*.tex"')  
        for file in p:lines() do                  
            print("Ajout de "..file)
            tex.print("\\input{"..file.."}")       
        end
    end
\end{luacode*}

\begin{document}

\directlua{input_dir("mydir")}

\end{document}

Compile it with lualatex --shell-escape yourfile.tex

score 3 · Answer 2 · answered Jun 15 '17 at 17:23

You could try texosquery if you have Java installed.

Example (where the sub-directory is called subdir):

\documentclass{article}

\usepackage{texosquery}

\makeatletter

% \inputfiles{dir}
\newcommand*{\inputfiles}[1]{%
 \TeXOSQueryRegularFileList{\result}{,}{#1}%
 \ifx\result\empty
   Query failed!
 \else
  \@for\thisfile:=\result\do{\input{#1/\thisfile}}%
 \fi
}

\makeatother

\begin{document}

\inputfiles{subdir}

\end{document}

That will input all regular files in the subdirectory. Alternatively you could apply a filter:

\documentclass{article}

\usepackage{texosquery}

\makeatletter

% \inputfiles{dir}
\newcommand*{\inputfiles}[1]{%
 \TeXOSQueryFilterFileList{\result}{,}{.+\string\.tex}{#1}%
 \ifx\result\empty
   Query failed!
 \else
  \@for\thisfile:=\result\do{\input{#1/\thisfile}}%
 \fi
}

\makeatother

\begin{document}

\inputfiles{subdir}

\end{document}

This will only match files ending with .tex.

Note: texosquery may require some setting up before first use. There should be a file called texosquery.cfg in your TeX distribution, which contains instructions on how to set it up. It will need editing if you have Java 8 (especially if you want to use it with the restricted shell escape) or if you have Java 5 or 6. The default is set up for Java 7 and unrestricted mode only.

\input an unspecified file from a directory

2 Answers2