file_exists — Checks whether a file or directory exists
Description
boolfile_exists
( string$filename
)
Checks whether a file or directory exists.
Parameters
filename
Path to the file or directory.
On windows, use //computername/share/filename or
\\computername\share\filename to check files on
network shares.
Return Values
Returns TRUE if the file or directory specified by
filename
exists; FALSE otherwise.
Note:
This function will return FALSE for symlinks pointing to non-existing
files.
Warning
This function returns FALSE for files inaccessible due to safe mode restrictions. However these
files still can be included if
they are located in safe_mode_include_dir.
Note:
The check is done using the real UID/GID instead of the effective one.
Examples
Example #1 Testing whether a file exists
<?php $filename = '/path/to/foo.txt';
if (file_exists($filename)) { echo "The file $filename exists"; } else { echo "The file $filename does not exist"; } ?>
Notes
Note: The results of this
function are cached. See clearstatcache() for
more details.
Tip
As of PHP 5.0.0, this function
can also be used with some URL wrappers. Refer to
List of Supported Protocols/Wrappers for a listing of which wrappers support
stat() family of functionality.