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Chapter 10: Problem 4

What three steps must be taken by a program when it uses a file?

Short Answer

Expert verified
Answer: The three main steps a program must take when working with a file are: 1) Opening the file using the "open" function, 2) Reading, Writing, or Modifying the file using functions such as "read()", "write()", and "writelines()", and 3) Closing the file with the "close()" function to save changes and release resources.

Step by step solution

01

Opening the file

The first step is to open the file that the program wants to interact with. This is done using the "open" function, which returns a file object. It takes two parameters: the path to the file and the mode, such as 'r' for reading, 'w' for writing, or 'a' for appending.
02

Reading or Writing/Modifying the file

After the file is opened, the program can read its content, write new data, or modify existing data. Depending on the opening mode, various methods such as "read()", "write()" and "writelines()" can be used to interact with the file content.
03

Closing the file

Once the program has finished reading, writing, or modifying the file, it must close it using the "close()" function. This is important because it ensures that any changes made to the file are saved and resources are released. Proper file handling helps prevent potential errors and data loss.

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Most popular questions from this chapter

What are the two types of file access? What is the difference between these two?

What is the purpose of the eof function?

Describe the way that you use a temporary file in a program that deletes a record from a sequential file.

Which of the following loops would you use to read all of the items from the file associated with myFile? a. While eof(myFile) Read myFile item End While b. While NOT eof(myFile) Read myFile item End While

In what mode do you open a file if you want to write data to it, but you do not want to erase the file’s existing contents? When you write data to such a file, to what part of the file is the data written?
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