fs.readdirSync()

Grab only the files or the directories inside of the specified path

const fs = require('fs');

// include file type
const dirOrFiles = fs.readdirSync('directory_path', { withFileTypes: true });

// filter for files
const filesNames = dirOrFiles
  .filter(dirent => dirent.isFile())
  .map(dirent => dirent.name);

// filter for directories
const directoryNames = dirOrFiles
  .filter(dirent => dirent.isDirectory())
  .map(dirent => dirent.name);

fs.readFile

// encoding as utf8
// returns file content as string
fs.readFile("dir/file", 'utf8', function(err, data ) {
  console.log( data );
});

fs.readFileSync

Synchronous version for readFile. Does not take a callback function.

const fs = require('fs');
const fileName = "myFile.txt";
const fileData = fs.readFileSync(fileName, "utf8");

__dirname

__dirname is an environment variable that tells you the absolute path of the directory containing the currently executing file

• value of directory where the current running JS file resides

vs process.cwd()

process.cwd() returns the value of directory where we run the Node process