Reading Directory Contents in PHP

The scandir function allows you to view the contents of a directory and get an array of the names of the files and subfolders in it. The function takes the file path as a parameter.

Let's assume we have a directory dir for example. Let's look at its contents:

php<?php
  $files = scandir('dir');
  var_dump($files);
?>

In the result array, the scandir function will also show the presence of directories with the names ".." and ".". Technically, the first name corresponds to a link to the parent directory, and the second - to the current one.

It's better to remove these names from the result array. This is done in the following way:

php<?php
  $files = scandir('dir');
  $files = array_diff($files, ['..', '.']); 
  var_dump($files);
?>

Can be simplified:

php<?php
  $files = array_diff(scandir('dir'), ['..', '.']); 
  var_dump($files);
?>