Represent directory tree as JSON

On Linux, the command-line tool tree can be used, although it is not installed by default. The output is almost identical to that required by the OP, using the flag -J for JSON output (which can then be streamed to a file for example):

tree -J folder

On OSX, this tool can be installed via Homebrew.

I just had to do this (well, almost) so hit this page but the above doesn't recurse into subdirectories.

So this version only handles directories, not files, but you could add those.

First generate a nested python dict:

def fs_tree(root):
    results = {}
    for (dirpath, dirnames, filenames) in os.walk(root):
        parts = dirpath.split(os.sep)
        curr = results
        for p in parts:
            curr = curr.setdefault(p, {})
    return results

Secondly dump that to json using the json module.

I don't think that this task is a "wheel" (so to speak). But it is something which you can easily achieve by means of the tools you mentioned:

import os
import json

def path_to_dict(path):
    d = {'name': os.path.basename(path)}
    if os.path.isdir(path):
        d['type'] = "directory"
        d['children'] = [path_to_dict(os.path.join(path,x)) for x in os.listdir\
(path)]
    else:
        d['type'] = "file"
    return d

print json.dumps(path_to_dict('.'))