I need to change C:\Program Files (x86) in C:\Progra~2 in the system path variable. I was thinking to do this with Powershell, so I came up with the following script.
$NewPath = (Get-ItemProperty -Path 'Registry::HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Environment' -Name PATH).Path
$OldValue = ${Program Files (x86)}
$NewValue = "Progra~2"
$NewPath = $NewPath -replace $OldValue, $NewValue
Set-ItemProperty -Path 'Registry::HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Environment' -Name PATH –Value $newPath
$NewPath
The output is unfortunately not what I expected.
Progra~2oProgra~2mProgra~2eProgra~21Progra~2\Progra~2oProgra~2pProgra~2mProgra~2nProgra~2\Progra~2bProgra~2iProgra~2nProgra~2;Progra~2CProgra~2:
Progra~2\Progra~2OProgra~2rProgra~2aProgra~2cProgra~2lProgra~2eProgra~2\Progra~2MProgra~2iProgra~2dProgra~2dProgra~2lProgra~2eProgra~2wProgra~2a
Can anyone help me out with this?
$OldValue = ${Program Files (x86)}
should be replaced by
$OldValue = "Program Files \(x86\)"
Backslashes \ escape the parens interpreted as a regex by -replace
Related
I tried following Remove leading spaces in Windows file names but it's not working for my use case.
I have a lot of folders and filenames that either have a blank space at the front or at the end. How would I go about removing those spaces in bulk?
This was the command-line command I used after following the linked post:
for /R %A IN ("* ") do #for /F "tokens=*" %B IN ("%~nxA") do #ren "%A" "%B"
But it didn't work out.
Update: thank you to all who replied trying to help. I think there is just a Windows-level glitch in the file system. I ended up just having to manually create new folders without leading and trailing spaces and then dragging all the files over manually then renaming those to non-trailing and leading names as well.
It's unclear whether or not you want a PowerShell solution, but there's a reasonable assumption to be made you might.
If you wanted a PowerShell solution, you could try this:
function Test-LeadingTrailingWhitespace {
param(
[Parameter(Mandatory)]
[String]$String
)
$String[0] -eq ' ' -Or $String[-1] -eq ' '
}
Get-ChildItem -Path "<path_to_folder>" | ForEach-Object {
if ($_.PSIsContainer -And (Test-LeadingTrailingWhitespace -String $_.Name)) {
$Destination = Split-Path -Path $_.FullName -Parent
$NewName = $_.Name.Trim()
Move-Item -Path $_ -Destination (Join-Path -Path $Destination -ChildPath $NewName)
}
elseif (Test-LeadingTrailingWhitespace -String $_.BaseName) {
$Destination = Split-Path -Path $_.FullName -Parent
$NewName = $_.BaseName.Trim() + $_.Extension
Move-Item -Path $_ -Destination (Join-Path -Path $Destination -ChildPath $NewName)
}
}
To be on the safe side, you could add -WhatIf or -Confirm on the Move-Item cmdlet. The former will tell you what would have changed without that parameter without actually making any changes (like a 'dry run'). The latter will prompt you for confirmation before making each change, giving you a chance to validate incrementally and not make changes en masse from the moment you hit enter.
Trim() is a method available for all strings in PowerShell:
Returns a new string in which all leading and trailing occurrences of a set of specified characters from the current string are removed.
You can loop over files and folder and check if they actually have a leading or trailing whitespace before renaming, this would avoid errors like:
Rename-Item: Source and destination path must be different.
We can use the -match matching operator with a simple regex ^\s|\s$ (starts with whitespace or ends with whitespace - regex101 link for a simple example) to see if the file or folder should be renamed:
Get-ChildItem path\to\startingfolder -Recurse | ForEach-Object {
$newName = switch($_) {
# handle folders
{ $_.PSIsContainer -and $_.Name -match '^\s|\s$' } {
$_.Name.Trim()
break
}
# handle files
{ $_.BaseName -match '^\s|\s$' -or $_.Extension -match '^\s|\s$' } {
$_.BaseName.Trim() + $_.Extension.Trim()
break
}
# if none of the above conditions were true, continue with next item
Default {
return
}
}
Rename-Item -LiteralPath $_.FullName -NewName $newName
}
Personally, I'd do this in two steps to rename folders and files separately. This to overcome the problem that when a folder is renamed, the items inside that folder all have a new path.
Using switch -Force allows renaming items such as hidden or read-only files
Using -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue swallows the error when the new name is equal to the existing name
$rootPath = 'X:\thepath'
# first the folders and subfolders (deepest nesting first)
(Get-ChildItem -Path $rootPath -Directory -Recurse | Sort-Object FullName -Descending) |
Rename-Item -NewName {$_.Name.Trim()} -Force -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
# next the files
(Get-ChildItem -Path $rootPath -File -Recurse) |
Rename-Item -NewName {'{0}{1}' -f $_.BaseName.Trim(), $_.Extension.Trim()} -Force -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
I try to create a folder using PowerShell for the following files
4_2017-07-16_01-22-52.mp4
4_2017-07-16_01-23-50.mp4
4_2017-07-16_01-24-54.mp4
4_2017-07-16_01-26-21.mp4
I use this method
https://stackoverflow.com/a/41468253/13002495
the problem that it will create a directory 4 then move the files to it what I need to have a directory like the following
4_2017-07-16 or a directory like 4_2017_07_16
this is the first method.
the second method if you can help to have a script to create the following directories
2017 directory then a subdirectory 02 then subdirectory 16 then a subdirectory 4 then move the files to subdirectory 4
so it will be as following
2017
--------07
------------16
---------------------04 ----> files will be here
can you help with these 2 methods?
You could try something like this:
$folder = 'FILES_FOLDER'
Get-ChildItem -Path $folder | ForEach-Object {
$subFolders = $_.Name.Split("-_")
$path = Get-Location
$order = 1, 2, 3, 0
$order | ForEach-Object {
$path = Join-Path -Path $path -ChildPath $subFolders[$_]
if (-not (Test-Path -Path $path -PathType Container)){
New-Item -Path $path -ItemType Directory
}
}
Move-Item -Path $_.FullName -Destination $path
}
Which will move all files to:
2017/07/16/4/4_2017-07-16_01-22-52.mp4
2017/07/16/4/4_2017-07-16_01-23-50.mp4
2017/07/16/4/4_2017-07-16_01-24-54.mp4
2017/07/16/4/4_2017-07-16_01-26-21.mp4
Explanation:
Split the files on "-" and "_" with Split. Can look at about_split for more information.
Get the current folder path with Get-Location, which is used to append to the current path for making sub directories.
Create an $order array to create the correct sub folder order as shown in the question.
Iterate through this $order array and create new directories if they dont exist. Can use Test-Path to check if the sub folders exist, and New-Item to create a new directory.
Move files to final sub directory with Move-Item. These sub directories will be in your current working directory. You could obviously change this to another directory location as well.
For your first method (one destination folder with name like 4_2017_07_16), you can do:
$source = 'D:\Mp4Files' # rootfolder where the files are
$destination = 'D:\Test' # rootfolder where the files need to go
Get-ChildItem -Path $source -File -Filter '*.mp4' |
Group-Object { ($_.BaseName -replace'(\d+_[^_]+).*', '$1') } |
ForEach-Object {
$targetFolder = Join-Path -Path $destination -ChildPath $_.Name
# create this folder if it does not already exist
if (!(Test-Path -Path $targetFolder -PathType Container)) {
$null = New-Item -Path $targetFolder -ItemType Directory
}
$_.Group | Move-Item -Destination $targetFolder
}
Result:
D:\TEST\4_2017-07-16
4_2017-07-16_01-22-52.mp4
4_2017-07-16_01-23-50.mp4
4_2017-07-16_01-24-54.mp4
4_2017-07-16_01-26-21.mp4
The second method creates more subfolders, based on the first part of the filenames:
$source = 'D:\Mp4Files'
$destination = 'D:\Test'
Get-ChildItem -Path $source -File -Filter '*.mp4' |
Group-Object { ($_.BaseName -replace'(\d+_[^_]+).*', '$1') } |
ForEach-Object {
$index, $year, $month, $day = $_.Name -split '[-_]'
$targetFolder = Join-Path -Path $destination -ChildPath ('{0}\{1:00}\{2:00}\{3:00}' -f $year, [int]$month, [int]$day, [int]$index)
# create this folder if it does not already exist
if (!(Test-Path -Path $targetFolder -PathType Container)) {
$null = New-Item -Path $targetFolder -ItemType Directory
}
$_.Group | Move-Item -Destination $targetFolder
}
Result:
D:\TEST\2017
\---07
\---16
\---04
4_2017-07-16_01-22-52.mp4
4_2017-07-16_01-23-50.mp4
4_2017-07-16_01-24-54.mp4
4_2017-07-16_01-26-21.mp4
I am currently writing a script that takes a folder of files, moves the first file to a folder with a specific name, then move the rest to another folder with a number for a name.
My script works however it also moves the folder and renames it too. Which section of the code is causing this?
$path = "C:\Users\User1\Desktop\MergeTest\_First\"
$FileCount = Get-ChildItem -Path $path -File | Measure-Object | %{$_.Count}
$FirstFile = Get-ChildItem -Path $path -Force -File | Select-Object -First 1
$FinalReport = "C:\Users\User1\Desktop\MergeTest\___Final\TestOutput.xlsx"
Move-Item "C:\Users\User1\Desktop\MergeTest\_First\$FirstFile" $FinalReport
$Counter = 0;
Write-host $FileCount
for($Counter = 0; $Counter -lt $FileCount; $Counter++)
{
$FileInWork = Get-ChildItem -Path $path -Force -File | Select-Object -First 1
move-item "C:\Users\User1\Desktop\MergeTest\_First\$FileInWork" "C:\Users\User1\Desktop\MergeTest\__Second\$Counter.xlsx"
Write-host "File Moved"
}
What you could do is specify the -Include *.txt condition to your move-item commands so it is only to move just .txt, .log, or whatever file type you're moving and leave the folder how it is.
I believe your code could do with some cleaning up. Now you are executing Get-ChildItem 3 times, where using it once is enough.
Also, you should try and use the Join-Path rather than constructing the path and filenames yourself.
Especially where you do "C:\Users\User1\Desktop\MergeTest\_First\$FileInWork", you should realize that Get-ChildItem returns FileInfo and/or DirectoryInfo objects; not strings.
Anyway, the below code should do what you want:
# define the path where all other paths are in
$rootPath = "C:\Users\User1\Desktop\MergeTest"
# create the working paths using the common root folder path
$filesPath = Join-Path -Path $rootPath -ChildPath '_First'
$firstDestination = Join-Path -Path $rootPath -ChildPath '___Final'
$secondDestination = Join-Path -Path $rootPath -ChildPath '__Second'
# test if the destination folders exist and if not create them
if (!(Test-Path -Path $firstDestination -PathType Container)) {
Write-Host "Creating folder '$firstDestination'"
$null = New-Item -Path $firstDestination -ItemType Directory
}
if (!(Test-Path -Path $secondDestination -PathType Container)) {
Write-Host "Creating folder '$secondDestination'"
$null = New-Item -Path $secondDestination -ItemType Directory
}
# get an array of all FileInfo objects in $filesPath
# you could consider adding -Filter '*.xlsx' here..
$allFiles = Get-ChildItem -Path $filesPath -Force -File
Write-Host 'Total number of files found: {0}' -f $allFiles.Count
# move the files
for ($i = 0; $i -lt $allFiles.Count; $i++) {
if ($i -eq 0) {
# the first file should go in the $firstDestination folder with specified name
$target = Join-Path -Path $firstDestination -ChildPath 'TestOutput.xlsx'
}
else {
# all other files go to the $secondDestination folder
# each file should have the index number as name
$target = Join-Path -Path $secondDestination -ChildPath ('{0}.xlsx' -f ($i + 1))
}
$allFiles[$i] | Move-Item -Destination $target -Force -WhatIf
}
Hope that helps
Remove the -WhatIf if you are satisfied with whatever the output on console shows.
P.S. I really think you should edit your question and change its title, because nothing in the question has to do with Folder deleting after script ends..
I want to move items with the .txt extension but not like this, hard-coded. I want to select from a folder all files with some extension and move them into a folder with the same name as extension. And I want to do that for all the extensions in the directory.
Any ideas?
Thank you!
Take a look at my code but I did it with hardcoded variables
$variable=Get-ChildItem -Path "C:\somePath"
foreach ($variables in $variable)
{
if($extension=($variables | Where {$_.extension -like ".txt"}))
{
New-Item -ItemType Directory -Path "C:\somePath\text"
$extension | Move-Item -Destination "C:\somePath\text"
}
}
Although this solution is not as clean-looking as the other solution, it does handle the case where the destination folders don't already exist. It also moves files that may contain special characters like []. It also explicitly ignores files with no extension since no requirement was given for those. The amount of looping is minimized through the use of Group-Object.
$Path = "C:\Somepath"
$files = Get-ChildItem -Path $Path -File |
Group-Object -Property {($_.extension |
Select-String -Pattern "[^. ]+").matches.value
}
Foreach ($ExtGroup in $files) {
$Destination = "$Path\$($ExtGroup.Name)"
if (!(Test-Path -Path $Destination -PathType Container)) {
$null = New-Item -Path $Destination -Type Directory
}
Move-Item -LiteralPath $ExtGroup.Group -Destination $Destination -Force
}
I believe this will do:
$variable = Get-ChildItem -Path "C:\somePath"
foreach ($v in $variable){
$dest = '{0}\{1}' -f $v.DirectoryName, ($v.Extension -replace '^\.')
$v | Move-Item -Destination $dest -Force
}
I am new to PowerShell and looking for some help. Here I am trying to create a text file in all the drives but seems I am missing something here, any help is appreciated:
$drives = get-psdrive -p "FileSystem"
foreach ($drive in $drives)
{
New-Item -Path '$drive:\IO.txt' -ItemType File
}
Also, have another query regarding the same that how I can exclude particular drives e.g. "A:", "C:", "D:" drives?
Thanks
I think this is more what you are after.
$drives = get-psdrive -p "FileSystem"
$exclude = "C","D"
foreach ($drive in $drives) {
# Exclamation (!) is the same as -not meaning if not $true > Do the thing
If(!$exclude.Contains($drive.Name)) {
New-Item -Path "$($drive):\IO.txt" -ItemType File
}
}
Give New-Item -ItemType File -Name "Filename.ext" a shot,
see: https://mathieubuisson.github.io/powershell-linux-bash/
A more PowerShell like way is to filter the drives with a Where-Object and
do it in a single pipe
Get-PSDrive -PSProvider "FileSystem" |
Where-Object Name -notmatch 'A|C|D' |
New-Item -Path {"$($_.Name):\IO.txt"} -ItemType File -WhatIf
If the output looks OK remove the trailing -WhatIf