Ben Hoyt

Ben turned a common inefficiency in Python’s directory handling into an adopted standard-library improvement. Python developers using os.scandir() and os.walk() benefit from fewer unnecessary operating-system calls when processing files and folders. The proposal’s documented benchmarks and clear explanation of design choices make this a useful example of evidence-led performance work, complemented by open-source maintenance and technical writing.

Ben Hoyt is an engineering manager and software engineer at Canonical, based in Christchurch, New Zealand. Alongside work at Canonical, Ben creates and maintains open-source tools and writes technical articles, with projects such as GoAWK and Python’s scandir focusing on practical tooling, performance and simplicity.

Ben authored PEP 471, the proposal that introduced os.scandir() into Python’s standard library in Python 3.5, and wrote the initial implementation, with Tim Golden contributing to the C extension module. The function reads directory entries while reusing information already supplied by the operating system, avoiding extra requests to check file details. The change also speeds up os.walk() when visiting files and folders within a directory tree. Benchmark data in the proposal demonstrates substantial performance gains across platforms and file systems, alongside reduced memory use when processing entries in large directories one at a time.