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# python-magic
[PyPI version]
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python-magic is a Python interface to the libmagic file type
identification library. libmagic identifies file types by checking
their headers according to a predefined list of file types. This
functionality is exposed to the command line by the Unix command
`file`.
## Usage
```python
>>> import magic
>>> magic.from_file("testdata/test.pdf")
'PDF document, version 1.2'
# recommend using at least the first 2048 bytes, as less can produce
incorrect identification
>>> magic.from_buffer(open("testdata/test.pdf", "rb").read(2048))
'PDF document, version 1.2'
>>> magic.from_file("testdata/test.pdf", mime=True)
'application/pdf'
```
There is also a `Magic` class that provides more direct control,
including overriding the magic database file and turning on character
encoding detection. This is not recommended for general use. In
particular, it's not safe for sharing across multiple threads and
will fail throw if this is attempted.
```python
>>> f = magic.Magic(uncompress=True)
>>> f.from_file('testdata/test.gz')
'ASCII text (gzip compressed data, was "test", last modified: Sat Jun 28
21:32:52 2008, from Unix)'
```
You can also combine the flag options:
```python
>>> f = magic.Magic(mime=True, uncompress=True)
>>> f.from_file('testdata/test.gz')
'text/plain'
```
## Installation
The current stable version of python-magic is available on PyPI and
can be installed by running `pip install python-magic`.
Other sources:
- PyPI: http://pypi.python.org/pypi/python-magic/
- GitHub: https://github.com/ahupp/python-magic
This module is a simple wrapper around the libmagic C library, and
that must be installed as well:
### Debian/Ubuntu
```
sudo apt-get install libmagic1
```
### Windows
You'll need DLLs for libmagic. @julian-r maintains a pypi package with the
DLLs, you can fetch it with:
```
pip install python-magic-bin
```
### OSX
- When using Homebrew: `brew install libmagic`
- When using macports: `port install file`
### Troubleshooting
- 'MagicException: could not find any magic files!': some
installations of libmagic do not correctly point to their magic
database file. Try specifying the path to the file explicitly in the
constructor: `magic.Magic(magic_file="path_to_magic_file")`.
- 'WindowsError: [Error 193] %1 is not a valid Win32 application':
Attempting to run the 32-bit libmagic DLL in a 64-bit build of
python will fail with this error. Here are 64-bit builds of libmagic for
windows: https://github.com/pidydx/libmagicwin64.
Newer version can be found here: https://github.com/nscaife/file-windows.
- 'WindowsError: exception: access violation writing 0x00000000 ' This may
indicate you are mixing
Windows Python and Cygwin Python. Make sure your libmagic and python
builds are consistent.
## Bug Reports
python-magic is a thin layer over the libmagic C library.
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