Periods in folder names causes reading errors (file not found)

[amateur]

Didn’t find anyone with this issue online.

When I point to a parent folder and use multiple ways to read all directories/files under it using a loop or Excel reader node, the code errors out saying the file doesn’t exist. After troubleshooting and trying to workaround the error, I found out the issue was a “.” (period) in the folder name. How do I make this work?
The directory is on the network and not owned by me. Hence, renaming is not an option.

I tried reading the folder using Excel reader, I made a custom path list of all the folders (~5000) into an excel file and fed it to table row to variable to feed the Path to excel reader… that didn’t work. When I deleted out the Paths with a . in the name, the loop worked fine.
EDIT: additional info. It looks like the error is only when the period is at the end of the folder name. Not in the middle. Example: /directory1/folder1/ is okay, but /directory1/folder1 Inc./ is an error.

Please help and go easy since I started using KNIME 8 hours ago. Former Alteryx beginner, and Tableau Prep hater. And please use easy language as analytics and data science is not my major/minor/hobby…

[gonhaddock]

Hello @amateur and welcome to the KNIME forum

You can use ‘List Files/Folders’ node to list all current parent folder content, with ‘Include subfolders’ option. If you have a list of file names (unique file names), you can use them as wildcards, aiming to validate the current path address in parent folder list.

Would this approach fit in your process?

BR

[amateur]

thanks… but I am not sure if that’s the case. The folders/files exist in the network drive. For some odd reason, KNIME can’t seem to process folders names that end in a period. I will try referencing the full Path as i think you are somewhat suggesting. Maybe they’ll help. I’ll report back once tested.

[gonhaddock]

Can you provide a dummy example of the folder name format. We can try to reproduce the problem…