Check whether a path is valid in Python without creating a file at the path's target

Question

I have a path (including directory and file name).
I need to test if the file-name is a valid, e.g. if the file-system will allow me to create a file with such a name.

Answer 1

open(filename,'r')   #2nd argument is r and not w

will open the file or give an error if it doesn't exist. If there's an error, then you can try to write to the path, if you can't then you get a second error

try:
    open(filename,'r')
    return True
except IOError:
    try:
        open(filename, 'w')
        return True
    except IOError:
        return False

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