Quickly create, use and delete temporary directories

This package allows you to quickly create, use and delete a temporary directory in the system’s temporary directory.

Here’s a quick example on how to create a temporary directory and delete it:

use Spatie\TemporaryDirectory\TemporaryDirectory;

$temporaryDirectory = (new TemporaryDirectory())->create();

// Get a path inside the temporary directory
$temporaryDirectory->path('temporaryfile.txt');

// Delete the temporary directory and all the files inside it
$temporaryDirectory->delete();

Installation

You can install the package via composer:

composer require spatie/temporary-directory

Usage

Creating a temporary directory

To create a temporary directory simply call the create method on a TemporaryDirectory object. By default the temporary directory will be created in a timestamped directory in your system’s temporary directory (usually /tmp).

(new TemporaryDirectory())->create();

Naming your temporary directory

If you want to use a custom name for your temporary directory instead of the timestamp call the name method with a string $name argument before the create method.

(new TemporaryDirectory())
   ->name($name)
   ->create();

By default an exception will be thrown if a directory already exists with the given argument. You can override this behaviour by calling the force method in combination with the name method.

(new TemporaryDirectory())
   ->name($name)
   ->force()
   ->create();

Setting a custom location for a temporary directory

You can set a custom location in which your temporary directory will be created by passing a string $location argument to the TemporaryDirectory constructor.

(new TemporaryDirectory($location))
   ->create();

Optionally you can call the location method with a $location argument.

(new TemporaryDirectory())
   ->location($location)
   ->create();

Determining paths within the temporary directory

You can use the path method to determine the full path to a file or directory in the temporary directory:

$temporaryDirectory = (new TemporaryDirectory())->create();
$temporaryDirectory->path('dumps/datadump.dat'); // return  /tmp/1485941876276/dumps/datadump.dat

Emptying a temporary directory

Use the clean method to delete all the files inside the temporary directory.

$temporaryDirectory->clean();

Deleting a temporary directory

Once you’re done processing your temporary data you can delete the entire temporary directory using the delete method. All files inside of it will be deleted.

$temporaryDirectory->delete();