How to run a http server which serves a specific path?

In Python 3.7 SimpleHTTPRequestHandler can take a directory argument:

import http.server
import socketserver

PORT = 8000
DIRECTORY = "web"


class Handler(http.server.SimpleHTTPRequestHandler):
    def __init__(self, *args, **kwargs):
        super().__init__(*args, directory=DIRECTORY, **kwargs)


with socketserver.TCPServer(("", PORT), Handler) as httpd:
    print("serving at port", PORT)
    httpd.serve_forever()

and from the command line:

python -m http.server --directory web

---

To get a little crazy... you could make handlers for arbitrary directories:

def handler_from(directory):
    def _init(self, *args, **kwargs):
        return http.server.SimpleHTTPRequestHandler.__init__(self, *args, directory=self.directory, **kwargs)
    return type(f'HandlerFrom<{directory}>',
                (http.server.SimpleHTTPRequestHandler,),
                {'__init__': _init, 'directory': directory})


with socketserver.TCPServer(("", PORT), handler_from("web")) as httpd:
    print("serving at port", PORT)
    httpd.serve_forever()

If you just want serve static file you can do it by running SimpleHTTPServer module using python 2:

 python -m SimpleHTTPServer

Or with python 3:

 python3 -m http.server

This way you do not need to write any script.

https://docs.python.org/3/library/http.server.html#http.server.SimpleHTTPRequestHandler

This class serves files from the current directory and below, directly mapping the directory structure to HTTP requests.

So you just need to change the current directory prior to starting the server - see os.chdir

eg:

import http.server
import socketserver
import os

PORT = 8000

web_dir = os.path.join(os.path.dirname(__file__), 'web')
os.chdir(web_dir)

Handler = http.server.SimpleHTTPRequestHandler
httpd = socketserver.TCPServer(("", PORT), Handler)
print("serving at port", PORT)
httpd.serve_forever()

Just for completeness, here's how you can setup the actual server classes to serve files from an arbitrary directory:

try
    # python 2
    from SimpleHTTPServer import SimpleHTTPRequestHandler
    from BaseHTTPServer import HTTPServer as BaseHTTPServer
except ImportError:
    # python 3
    from http.server import HTTPServer as BaseHTTPServer, SimpleHTTPRequestHandler


class HTTPHandler(SimpleHTTPRequestHandler):
    """This handler uses server.base_path instead of always using os.getcwd()"""
    def translate_path(self, path):
        path = SimpleHTTPRequestHandler.translate_path(self, path)
        relpath = os.path.relpath(path, os.getcwd())
        fullpath = os.path.join(self.server.base_path, relpath)
        return fullpath


class HTTPServer(BaseHTTPServer):
    """The main server, you pass in base_path which is the path you want to serve requests from"""
    def __init__(self, base_path, server_address, RequestHandlerClass=HTTPHandler):
        self.base_path = base_path
        BaseHTTPServer.__init__(self, server_address, RequestHandlerClass)

Then you can set any arbitrary path in your code:

web_dir = os.path.join(os.path.dirname(__file__), 'web')
httpd = HTTPServer(web_dir, ("", 8000))
httpd.serve_forever()