Skip to main content
Deno.seek - Deno documentation
function Deno.seek
seek(
rid: number,
offset: number | bigint,
whence: SeekMode,
): Promise<number>
Deprecated

This will be removed in Deno 2.0. See the Deno 1.x to 2.x Migration Guide for migration instructions.

Seek a resource ID (rid) to the given offset under mode given by whence. The call resolves to the new position within the resource (bytes from the start).

// Given file.rid pointing to file with "Hello world", which is 11 bytes long:
using file = await Deno.open(
  "hello.txt",
  { read: true, write: true, truncate: true, create: true },
);
await file.write(new TextEncoder().encode("Hello world"));

// advance cursor 6 bytes
const cursorPosition = await Deno.seek(file.rid, 6, Deno.SeekMode.Start);
console.log(cursorPosition);  // 6
const buf = new Uint8Array(100);
await file.read(buf);
console.log(new TextDecoder().decode(buf)); // "world"

The seek modes work as follows:

// Given file.rid pointing to file with "Hello world", which is 11 bytes long:
using file = await Deno.open(
  "hello.txt",
  { read: true, write: true, truncate: true, create: true },
);
await file.write(new TextEncoder().encode("Hello world"));

// Seek 6 bytes from the start of the file
console.log(await Deno.seek(file.rid, 6, Deno.SeekMode.Start)); // "6"
// Seek 2 more bytes from the current position
console.log(await Deno.seek(file.rid, 2, Deno.SeekMode.Current)); // "8"
// Seek backwards 2 bytes from the end of the file
console.log(await Deno.seek(file.rid, -2, Deno.SeekMode.End)); // "9" (i.e. 11-2)

Parameters

rid: number
offset: number | bigint
whence: SeekMode

Return Type

Promise<number>