I use the FTP plugin to give me remote access to files. I am trying to write a macro to look in the directory of the file I have open in a buffer and determine if another file exists in the same directory.

On a local file system I would simply create a File instance using a path string I constructed and check to see if it exists, like this:

dirname = dir(buffer.getPath());
FQPN = dirname + "new file name";
java.io.File newFile = new java.io.File(FQPN);
if (newFile.exists()) {
//do stuff
}


If I try this when my buffer is on my remote server, newFile.exists() always returns false, regardless of whether the file actually exists or not. I think this is because dirname is something like "ftp://myuserid@myremotehost:21/path/to/new_file_name" and the normal java.io.File.exists() method does not understand URI's like this.

Any ideas on how to tell if the remote file exists or not?

I tried unconditionally opening the file and checking the length of the buffer, expecting a new file to have zero length and then I could close it immediately, but since jEdit.openFile(view, pathToFile) does not seem to be a blocking operation, trying to get the buffer length did not work:


1. aBuffer = jEdit.openFile(view,FQPN);
2. if (aBuffer.getLength() == 0) {
3. // file is new, so close it, as I only want new buffer if file exists
4. }


Could I put a VFSManager.waitForRequests() call between line 1 & 2 to wait for the FTP I/O to complete before checking the buffer length? Is this a static call? If not how to I get access to the VFSManager instance associated with my FTP connection?

Thanks!!

Tom Porter