Replace .absolute() with .resolve()

[noklam]

Description

Potentially helps

• Standalone Kedro Catalog #2059
• Make it easier to use the Config Loader #2819

Context

See #2819 (comment)
See docs:

Path.resolve(strict=False)¶
Make the path absolute, resolving any symlinks. A new path object is returned:
Python Discussion Thread: https://discuss.python.org/t/pathlib-absolute-vs-resolve/2573/11

The only way to remove .. in a path is using .resolve(), this is useful when user need to instantiate DataCatalog in a notebook, because the project root is in ../ one level up.

Possible Implementation

Possible Alternatives

[astrojuanlu]

About symlinks, notice that in #2346 I was advocating for the opposite: replacing .resolve() with .absolute().

this is useful when user need to instantiate DataCatalog in a notebook, because the project root is in ../ one level up.

If we do away with the magic path conversion as proposed in #2965, is this still needed?

[noklam]

In [5]: p
Out[5]: PosixPath('../x/ee')

In [6]: p.absolute()
Out[6]: PosixPath('/Users/Nok_Lam_Chan/tmp/pp/../x/ee')

In [7]: p.resolve()
Out[7]: PosixPath('/Users/Nok_Lam_Chan/tmp/x/ee')

I don't think we should replace resolve with absolute

#2977 requires a way to handle hidden objects, the relative path are determined with .. We can use a more sophisticated regex to avoid ../ maybe, but I don't think we should take this approach.

If you want to walk an arbitrary filesystem path upwards, it is recommended to first call Path.resolve() so as to resolve symlinks and eliminate ".." components.

Quote from the docs, shouldn't we want to support symlink? The #2346 is a rather niche case to instantiate KedroCLI from a special directory

Path.absolute()¶
Make the path absolute, without normalization or resolving symlinks. Returns a new path object:

Path.resolve(strict=False)¶
Make the path absolute, resolving any symlinks. A new path object is returned:

[noklam]

Actually I have a second look. This is the only case that in our codebase use absolute()

kedro/kedro/framework/cli/utils.py

Lines 204 to 218 in a91ccdb

	def get_pkg_version(reqs_path: (str | Path), package_name: str) -> str:
	"""Get package version from requirements.txt.
	Args:
	reqs_path: Path to requirements.txt file.
	package_name: Package to search for.
	Returns:
	Package and its version as specified in requirements.txt.
	Raises:
	KedroCliError: If the file specified in ``reqs_path`` does not exist
	or ``package_name`` was not found in that file.
	"""
	reqs_path = Path(reqs_path).absolute()

This is the only leftover we used .absolute() in the codebase.

#2819 (comment)
Additionally, we may always do a resolve in ConfigLoader so even if user provide a relative path it would work. I will add this comment to #2971, depends on the implementation we may avoid this completely with the new root argument.

This ticket will remains as a clean up ticket.

[merelcht]

Do we still need to do this?

[astrojuanlu]

I actually think we should close this and do the opposite: #2346

[merelcht]

@noklam is this also completed by #3742 ?

[noklam]

@merelcht It didn't change by #3742.

kedro/kedro/framework/cli/utils.py

Lines 204 to 218 in a91ccdb

	def get_pkg_version(reqs_path: (str | Path), package_name: str) -> str:
	"""Get package version from requirements.txt.
	Args:
	reqs_path: Path to requirements.txt file.
	package_name: Package to search for.
	Returns:
	Package and its version as specified in requirements.txt.
	Raises:
	KedroCliError: If the file specified in ``reqs_path`` does not exist
	or ``package_name`` was not found in that file.
	"""
	reqs_path = Path(reqs_path).absolute()

I just check again, this function is not used anywhere in framework, but only tests. (last change is 4 years ago). Maybe at some points it was used for kedro build-reqs? I suggest we deprecate this function since it's a public function and move it to test.

[astrojuanlu]

+1

[astrojuanlu]

@noklam should we rename and re-scope this issue? Alternatively we can close this one as "won't fix" and open a new one about deprecating get_pkg_version

[noklam]

@astrojuanlu let's close this ticket and open a new one, the context aren't that relevant here.

I will do it shortly.

[noklam]

Closed and open #3789