# <filesystem>

**[<filesystem>](https://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/header/filesystem)** provides portable file and directory operations: `std::filesystem::path`, `std::filesystem::exists`, `std::filesystem::is_regular_file`, `std::filesystem::directory_iterator`, etc. It abstracts away differences between POSIX and Windows paths.

Use it for any code that creates, lists, or inspects files and directories. It's far better than hand-written string manipulation with `mkdir` or `opendir`.

## Example

This example iterates through all entries in the current directory, printing their names portably across platforms.

```cpp
// compile: g++ -std=c++17 -o filesystemexample filesystemexample.cpp
// run: ./filesystemexample
// description: list files in a directory

#include <filesystem>
#include <iostream>

namespace fs = std::filesystem;

int main() {
    fs::path dir(".");
    
    if (fs::exists(dir) && fs::is_directory(dir)) {
        for (const auto& entry : fs::directory_iterator(dir)) {
            std::cout << entry.path().filename().string() << "\n";
        }
    }
    
    return 0;
}
```