PHP Classes

PHP List Windows Drives: Retrieve the letters of the drives on Windows

Recommend this page to a friend!
     
  Info   Example   View files Files   Install with Composer Install with Composer   Download Download   Reputation   Support forum   Blog    
Ratings Unique User Downloads Download Rankings
StarStarStarStar 60%Total: 268 All time: 7,736 This week: 65Up
Version License PHP version Categories
win-logical-drives 1.0.0BSD License5.5PHP 5, System information, Windows
Description 

Author

This package can retrieve the letters of the drives on Windows.

There is a class that can retrieve the list of all drive letters for assigned or unassigned drives using WMI (Windows Management Instrumentation) interface.

Another class can retrieve the details of each drive like the drive type, the network name, and whether it is a compact disk (CD), local disk, network drive, RAM disk, or a removable disk.

Innovation Award
PHP Programming Innovation award nominee
November 2016
Number 14
In Windows the different storage devices are defined by drives. Each drive has one letter assigned to it.

This package can retrieve the list of drives using the WMI interface, as well the characteristics of each drive.

Manuel Lemos
Picture of Christian Vigh
  Performance   Level  
Name: Christian Vigh <contact>
Classes: 32 packages by
Country: France France
Age: 58
All time rank: 13410 in France France
Week rank: 16 Up2 in France France Up
Innovation award
Innovation award
Nominee: 20x

Winner: 3x

Example

<?php
   
/****************************************************************************************************

        This example demonstrates how to use the various methods of the LogicalDrives class.

     ****************************************************************************************************/
   
require ( 'LogicalDrives.phpclass' ) ;

    if (
php_sapi_name ( ) != 'cli' )
        echo (
"<pre>" ) ;

   
$ld = new LogicalDrives ( ) ;

   
// Show assigned drive letters, with their label
    // Note that the $ld object can be accessed as an array, providing the drive letter as an index
    // (the drive letter can be followed by an optional semicolon and is not case-sensitive)
   
echo ( "Assigned drives :\n" ) ;

    foreach (
$ld -> GetAssignedDrives ( ) as $drive_letter )
        echo (
"\t$drive_letter ({$ld [ $drive_letter ] -> VolumeName})\n" ) ;

   
// Show unassigned drives
   
echo ( "Unassigned drives : " . implode ( ', ', $ld -> GetUnassignedDrives ( ) ) . "\n" ) ;

   
// Next available drive letter
   
echo ( "Next available drive : " . $ld -> GetNextAVailableDrive ( ) . "\n" ) ;


Details

INTRODUCTION

The LogicalDrives class is a small utility class that works only on Windows platforms and allows you to query the logical disks that are declared on your system.

It relies on the Windows Management Instrumentation interface (WMI) to retrieve logical drive information.

DOCUMENTATION

Documentation about WMI can be found here : https://msdn.microsoft.com/fr-fr/library/aa394582(v=vs.85).aspx.aspx "https://msdn.microsoft.com/fr-fr/library/aa394582(v=vs.85).aspx").

You can also get some information about the kind of data held in a LogicalDrive object here : https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa394173(v=vs.85).aspx.aspx "https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa394173(v=vs.85).aspx") (an object of class LogicalDrive maps directly to the WMI class Win32_LogicalDisk).

Additionally, you will find a more generic WMI access implementation in PHP here : http://www.phpclasses.org/package/10001-PHP-Provides-access-to-Windows-WMI.html

OVERVIEW

Before retrieving drive information, you need to have an instance of the LogicalDrives class :

include ( 'LogicalDrives.phpclass' ) ;

$ld 	=  new LogicalDrives ( ) ;

The constructor takes no parameter.

You can then call one of the methods implemented by the LogicalDrives class, such as GetAssignedDrives(), which retrieves the list of currently assigned logical drives :

$assigned_drives 	=  $ld -> GetAssignedDrives ( ) ;

the method will return an array of strings containing the drive letters that are currently assigned on your system, followed by a semicolon. You can go further and use them for indexing your LogicalDrives instance and get access to individual drive information, which will be presented as an object of class LogicalDrive ; the following example will display the volume name (or label) for each drive letter that has been assigned to your system :

foreach  ( $assigned_drives  as  $letter )
   {
		$drive 		=  $ld [ $letter ] 	; 	// You can access a LogicalDrives object as an array

		echo "Drive $letter ({$drive -> VolumeName})\n" ;

}

REFERENCE

LogicalDrives class

The LogicalDrives class is the main interface to access logical drive information. Since it implements the ArrayAccess interface, it can be accessed using either :

  • an integer index ; integer indexes are limited to the range 0..25, for the drive letters 'A' through 'Z'
  • a string index ; in this case, this is a drive letter optionally followed by a semicolon, such as in : "A", "B:", "C", "D:", etc.

The class also implements the Iterator interface, meaning that you can retrieve individual drive information using foreach() constructs.

Constructor

The constructor takes no parameter and immediately retrieves information about all the logical disks that are defined on your system.

GetAssignedDrives

public function  GetAssignedDrives ( ) 

Returns an array of strings representing the drive letters that are currently assigned on your system.

Drive letters are systematically in uppercase and followed by a semicolon.

GetNextAvailableDrive

public function  GetNextAVailableDrive ( )

Returns the next available drive letter.

Drive letters are systematically in uppercase and followed by a semicolon.

GetUnassignedDrives

public function  GetUnassignedDrives ( )

Returns an array of strings representing the drive letters that are currently unassigned on your system (and therefore free for later use).

Drive letters are systematically in uppercase and followed by a semicolon.

LogicalDrive class

The LogicalDrive class encapsulates a Wmi WIN32\_LogicalDisk object for a given logical drive and implements all the properties that can be found in such an object (see https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa394173(v=vs.85).aspx.aspx "https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa394173(v=vs.85).aspx") for more information about this Wmi class, and about all the constants that are defined in the LogicalDrive class).

You will find additional methods and constants that are described below :

GetDriveType

public function  GetDriveType ( )

Returns the drive type as a string ; it can be any of the following values, depending on the drive :

  • "Unknown" : Unknown drive type
  • "No root directory" : Drive is assigned, but does not contain any root directory (and maybe, no filesystem at all)
  • "Removable disk" : Drive is a removable disk, such as a USB device
  • "Local disk" : Local disk, physically hardwired to your system
  • "Network drive" : Drive is mapped to a network resource.
  • "Compact disk" : Drive is a compact disk reader and/or writer
  • "Ram disk" : Drive is a ram disk
  • "Unknown drive type 0xab" : Drive type unknown. "ab" gives the hex code of the drive type.

This method is designed only to provide a human-readable string describing the drive type. To programmatically determine the actual drive type, it is far better to use the DriveType property and compare it against one of the LogicalDrive::DRIVE\_TYPE\_\* constants.

GetNetworkName

public function  GetNetworkName ( ) ;

Returns an associative array containing the following entries :

  • 'fullname' : the full network name (eg, "\\\\myhost\\myresource"1)
  • 'host' : the server name (eg, "myhost")
  • 'resource' : the resource name (eg, "myresource")

Isxxx() classification functions

$status 	=  $drive -> IsCompactDisk ( ) ;
$status 	=  $drive -> IsLocalDisk ( ) ;
$status 	=  $drive -> IsNetworkDrive ( ) ;
$status 	=  $drive -> IsRamDisk ( ) ;
$status 	=  $drive -> IsRemovableDisk ( ) ;

These functions check that the drive has the specified characteristic : compact disk, local to the system, network-mapped, ram disk or removable disk.

NormalizeLetter

public static function  NormalizeDriveLetter ( $letter )

This function is mainly used internally, but has been made public in case of... It returns a "normalized" drive letter corresponding to the supplied input.

The return value is always an uppercase letter followed by a semicolon.

ArrayAccess and Iterator interfaces

The LogicalDrive class implements the ArrayAccess and Iterator interfaces, so that you can use for() or foreach() constructs to loop through the individual properties currently exposed by the underlying WMI object.

Constants

All the constants described below are documented here : https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa394173(v=vs.85).aspx.aspx "https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa394173(v=vs.85).aspx")

  • Drive access types (Access property) : - DRIVE\_ACCESS\_UNKNOWN - DRIVE\_ACCESS\_READ - DRIVE\_ACCESS\_WRITE - DRIVE\_ACCESS\_READ\_WRITE - DRIVE\_ACCESS\_WRITE\_ONCE
  • Drive availabilities (Availability property) : - DRIVE\_AVAILABILITY\_OTHER - DRIVE\_AVAILABILITY\_UNKNOWN - DRIVE\_AVAILABILITY\_RUNNING - DRIVE\_AVAILABILITY\_WARNING - DRIVE\_AVAILABILITY\_TESTING - DRIVE\_AVAILABILITY\_NOT\_APPLICABLE - DRIVE\_AVAILABILITY\_POWER\_OFF - DRIVE\_AVAILABILITY\_OFFLINE - DRIVE\_AVAILABILITY\_OFF\_DUTY - DRIVE\_AVAILABILITY\_DEGRADED - DRIVE\_AVAILABILITY\_NOT\_INSTALLED - DRIVE\_AVAILABILITY\_INSTALL\_ERROR - DRIVE\_AVAILABILITY\_POWER\_SAVE\_UNKNOWN\_STATE - DRIVE\_AVAILABILITY\_POWER\_SAVE\_LOW\_POWER - DRIVE\_AVAILABILITY\_POWER\_SAVE\_STANDBY - DRIVE\_AVAILABILITY\_POWER\_CYCLE - DRIVE\_AVAILABILITY\_POWER\_SAVE\_WARNING
  • Drive types (DriveType property) : - DRIVE\_TYPE\_UNKNOWN - DRIVE\_TYPE\_NO\_ROOT\_DIRECTORY - DRIVE\_TYPE\_REMOVABLE\_DISK - DRIVE\_TYPE\_LOCAL\_DISK - DRIVE\_TYPE\_NETWORK\_DRIVE - DRIVE\_TYPE\_COMPACT\_DISK - DRIVE\_TYPE\_RAM\_DISK
  • Media types (MediaType property) : - MEDIA\_TYPE\_UNKNOWN - MEDIA\_TYPE\_FLOPPY\_5\_1x2\_512bs - MEDIA\_TYPE\_FLOPPY\_5\_1x44\_512bs - MEDIA\_TYPE\_FLOPPY\_2x88\_512bs - MEDIA\_TYPE\_FLOPPY\_3\_20x8\_512bs - MEDIA\_TYPE\_FLOPPY\_3\_720\_512bs - MEDIA\_TYPE\_FLOPPY\_5\_360\_512bs - MEDIA\_TYPE\_FLOPPY\_5\_320\_512bs - MEDIA\_TYPE\_FLOPPY\_5\_320\_1024bs - MEDIA\_TYPE\_FLOPPY\_5\_180\_512bs - MEDIA\_TYPE\_FLOPPY\_5\_160\_512bs - MEDIA\_TYPE\_REMOVABLE\_MEDIA - MEDIA\_TYPE\_FIXED\_HARD\_DISK - MEDIA\_TYPE\_FLOPPY\_3\_120M\_512bs - MEDIA\_TYPE\_FLOPPY\_3\_640\_512bs - MEDIA\_TYPE\_FLOPPY\_5\_640\_512bs - MEDIA\_TYPE\_FLOPPY\_5\_7230\_512bs - MEDIA\_TYPE\_FLOPPY\_3\_1x2\_512bs - MEDIA\_TYPE\_FLOPPY\_3\_1x23\_1024bs - MEDIA\_TYPE\_FLOPPY\_5\_1x23\_1024bs - MEDIA\_TYPE\_FLOPPY\_3\_128M\_512bs - MEDIA\_TYPE\_FLOPPY\_3\_230M\_512bs - MEDIA\_TYPE\_FLOPPY\_8\_256\_128bs
  • Power management capabilities (PowerManagementCapabilities property, which can be any combination of the flags listed below) : - PMC\_UNKNOWN - PMC\_NOT\_SUPPORTED - PMC\_DISABLED - PMC\_ENABLED - PMC\_AUTO\_POWER\_SAVING - PMC\_POWER\_STATE\_SETTABLE - PMC\_POWER\_CYCLING\_SUPPORTED - PMC\_TIMED\_POWER\_ON\_SUPPORTED
  • Logical device state (StatusInfo property) : - STATUS\_OTHER - STATUS\_UNKNOWN - STATUS\_ENABLED - STATUS\_DISABLED - STATUS\_NOT\_APPLICABLE

  Files folder image Files (3)  
File Role Description
Accessible without login Plain text file example.php Example Example script
Plain text file LogicalDrives.phpclass Class Class source
Accessible without login Plain text file README.md Doc. Documentation

The PHP Classes site has supported package installation using the Composer tool since 2013, as you may verify by reading this instructions page.
Install with Composer Install with Composer
 Version Control Reuses Unique User Downloads Download Rankings  
 100%1
Total:268
This week:0
All time:7,736
This week:65Up
User Ratings User Comments (1)
 All time
Utility:75%StarStarStarStar
Consistency:75%StarStarStarStar
Documentation:75%StarStarStarStar
Examples:81%StarStarStarStarStar
Tests:-
Videos:-
Overall:60%StarStarStarStar
Rank:1150
 
excelent class
4 years ago (Luis Carrizo)
70%StarStarStarStar