How Can I Reliably Get File Creation and Modification Times Across Different Operating Systems?

Cross-Platform File Creation and Modification Date/Time Retrieval

Obtaining the file creation and modification dates/times across different operating systems can be a complex task.

Modification Dates

Getting file modification dates cross-platform is relatively straightforward using os.path.getmtime(), which provides the Unix timestamp of the last modification.

Creation Dates

For file creation dates, the process becomes more intricate due to platform-specific implementations:

• Windows: Windows stores the creation date in the file's ctime. It can be accessed through os.path.getctime() or the .st_ctime attribute of os.stat().
• Mac: On Mac and certain Unix-based OSes, the .st_birthtime attribute of os.stat() provides the creation date.
• Linux: Linux does not currently have a standardized way to retrieve creation dates. While some file systems, like ext4, store the data, the Linux kernel does not provide a direct method for accessing it. The closest alternative is the file's mtime, which indicates the last content modification.

Cross-Platform Code

Combining these platform-specific approaches, a cross-platform code snippet is as follows:

import os
import platform

def creation_date(path_to_file):
    """
    Try to get the date that a file was created, falling back to when it was
    last modified if that isn't possible.
    See http://stackoverflow.com/a/39501288/1709587 for explanation.
    """
    if platform.system() == 'Windows':
        return os.path.getctime(path_to_file)
    else:
        stat = os.stat(path_to_file)
        try:
            return stat.st_birthtime
        except AttributeError:
            # We're probably on Linux. No easy way to get creation dates here,
            # so we'll settle for when its content was last modified.
            return stat.st_mtime

This code first checks the platform to apply the appropriate method. On Windows, it uses os.path.getctime(), while on Mac and some Unix-based OSes, it attempts to retrieve the creation date using .st_birthtime. For Linux, it falls back to the modification date obtained through .st_mtime.

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