Answered What is the best way to create folders and files using the MODX API?

I have a project where I need to write a folder structure that is context_key dependent. I created a plugin that is triggered by the OnContextSave event and based on the new context_key name, it writes a specific folder structure.

My question is how can I use the MODX API to write these folders. My prototype just uses the php mkdir command, but I am sure that it would be best to do this with maybe XPDO->writeTree or something from the API.

I am having a hard time following the MODX documentation to come up with a solution. Anyone have an idea on the best practice here?

https://rtfm.modx.com/revolution/2.x/developing-in-modx/advanced-development/modx-services/modfilehandler

Yeah, I tried to implement that but with no success...

$directory = $modx->fileHandler->make($path); Did nothing....

You called the fileHandler service first?

I see. I tried it out and didn't get anywhere with it. Will try to find out what the story is with it and get back to you.

Hi Susan,

That would be fantastic!!

I can't think of any reason not to just use mkdir(). Maybe I'm missing something.

Using the API to create and update MODX objects in the database makes sense. Files are just files, though, and really have nothing to do with MODX or the database.

If you wanted to coordinate the folders with MODX Media Sources, you could do that with the API, but even then, it would still make sense use native PHP methods to create the files and folders (which is all that writeTree does).

The writeTree() method would be handy if it took a nested array of directories as an argument and created them. Instead, though, it takes a single directory path string, which makes it fairly inefficient for creating a tree of directories. Using mkdir($path, $dirPermission, true) will do the same thing, and probably much faster.

Yeah, that is the question in general. I thought there may have been a recommended best practice when using MODX to write folders to the server. I was thinking that it would be safer or more server compatible to let MODX handle things such as read/write permissions when creating a directory.

The main purpose of the core of MODX is to do database stuff. Most of the file management that it does is for internal use, not to use as an API.

There are references in the code to new_file_permissions and new_folder_permissions System Settings and there are lexicon strings for them, but in my installations, those settings don't exist and I've never seen them set.