# Database Discussions > Oracle >  reading a directory listing in SQL/PLUS

## deck1978

*Windows 2000 and Oracle 9i*

I'm having troubles figuring out how to read a current directory listing into a variable or record.

What i want to do is get a list of directories and be able to manipulate the data returned per directory.

ie.

dir /d/b

program files
temp
windows

then do something like
insert into crap values('program files');

thanks in advance

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## Philippe

Hi Deck,

Im not sure thats the best solution but you could consider spooling the result of you dir command into a file with the host command:

SQL > host dir/d/b > c:\result.txt
Then access the file and read the result with the GET_LINE  function of the UTL_FILE package

Hope this helps.

Philippe

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