I have the following command line that extracts the timestamp, size, and file name of specific files, however I need the entire path listed. What should I use for this task?
DIR "C:\Users\Heather\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files\Content.IE5\" "*Process*" /S /A:-D /TW /OSD
Assuming you are looking for files matching the pattern *Process* within the directory C:\Users\Heather\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files\Content.IE5\, you could use the following code:
forfiles /S /P "C:\Users\Heather\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files\Content.IE5" /M "*Process*" /C "cmd /C if #isdir==FALSE echo #fdate #ftime #fsize #path"
The great advantage of the forfiles command is that the time stamp is returned with a resolution of 1 second (rather than 1 minute as with dir or for).
However, the sort order you used in your dir command line (/O:SD) is not maintained.
for /f "delims=" %a in ('DIR "C:\Users\heather\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files\Content.IE5\" "*Process*" /S/b /A:-D') do #echo %~za %~da %~ta %~fa
should provide that data.
Note that you appear to be looking for all files in "C:\Users\heather\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files\Content.IE5\" and also for "Process"
Related
I'm using wordconv.exe to convert a bunch of a old doc files into docx. Afterwards I'd like to delete the original doc files.
When I run "del /S *.doc" on the command line it deletes both the doc and docx files. Anyway to get it to delete just .doc files?
Thanks!
Let's try to use something like this:
forfiles /s /m *.doc /c "cmd /c del #file"
The problem is the short 8.3 names of the files, because for internal cmd commands and also many external ones, wild-cards (*, ?) also match against them. For example, a file like important-document.docx has got a short name like import~1.doc, which is matched by *.doc.
There are some commands that treat wild-cards differently:
forfiles (as already demonstrated in the answer by Michał Mielczarek):
forfiles /S /M "*.doc" /C "cmd /C if #isdir==FALSE del #relpath"
The #isdir query checks whether the current item is a file and lets skip folders.
where:
for /F "delims=" %%F in ('set "PATHEXT=" ^& where /R "." "*.doc"') do #del "%%~F"
The surrounding for /F loop captures the result of where. The command set "PATHEXT=" deletes the PATHEXT variable in the cmd instance in which where is executed, because this also regards that variable, so a file like important-document.doc.com could also be matched unintentionally with a default value of PATHEXT of .COM;.EXE;.BAT;.CMD, for instance.
Although the where approach appears a little bit more complicated, you might prefer it, because it is faster than forfiles, particularly when having a huge directory tree.
N. B.:
forfiles /M "*.*" does not match files (or folders) with no extension (so use /M "*" to match something like testfile), but where "*.*" does, so this indicates that these two commands have their own individual wild-card handling/substitution routines.
for /f "tokens=*" %%? in ('dir /b /a-d /s *.doc') do if /i "%%~x?"==".doc" del "%%~f?"
You can add if exist "%%~dpn?.docx" before del, if .doc and .docx are in same folder.
I am using the following code in a .bat to cleanup a directory. It is to delete any directory with a time stamp older than 14 days. The thing is, this script works and deletes the appropriate directories. However it returns the error:
ERROR: The system cannot find the file specified I am unable to decipher the cause of this, and would like to get to the bottom of it.
FORFILES /S /D -14 /p %cd% /M "*" /C "cmd /c IF #isdir == TRUE rmdir #path /s /q"
As to the follow up question you asked:
Using a Windows batch file, find directories that do not contain any letters in their name. They can contain special characters and spaces. Delete the directories and their sub-folders w/o confirmation.
Put 1.bat in the directory you want to cleanup. Open a cmd window and run 1.bat.
Find all directories that do not contain any letters in their name and output their names to 1.txt. They can contain special characters and spaces.
Echo the directories to be removed. Do not remove them.
Remove comment tag to remove directories and sub-directories w/o confirmation.
1.bat
for /f "usebackq delims=|" %%a in ('DIR /b /ad ^| findstr /v /r "[a-Z]"') do echo "%cd%\%%a" will be removed without confirmation.
:: for /f "usebackq delims=|" %%a in ('DIR /b /ad ^| findstr /v /r "[a-Z]"') do rd /s /q "%cd%\%%a"
I'm writing a batch file for Windows 7.
I currently have a code that deletes old backups from our masters folders within our site management folders. This is the code:
for /d %%A in ("Y:\*.*") do del /s /q /f "%%A\masters\*.bak"
However I need to code it to only delete things that are older than 3 years, which would be this code:
forfiles /P "Y:\" /S /D -1096 /M *.bak /C "cmd /C del #path"
However I need what is in the top code so that I can delete all *.bak files from the masters folders that exist within our 173 site management folders. I'm ripping my hair out figuring this out. I can't have it deleting *.bak files from our other folders.
I've tried combining the code, but below command line in batch file does not work as expected:
forfiles /S /D -1096 /M *.bak /C "cmd /C for /d %%A in ("Y:\*.*") do del /s /q /f "%%A\masters\*.bak"
How to delete all *.bak files older than 3 years anywhere in directory tree if second directory in file path is masters and keep all other *.bak files being newer or in a directory where second directory in file path is not masters?
Create first a batch file C:\Temp\DeleteBackup.bat with the following commands:
#echo off
set "BackupFileName=%~1"
if not "%BackupFileName:\masters\=%" == "%BackupFileName%" ECHO del "%BackupFileName%"
This batch code checks if the file name with full path and file extension contains anywhere \masters\ by removing this string case-insensitive from left argument of string comparison.
If the remaining string is not equal the unmodified file name string because of containing \masters\ in path, the IF condition is true and the backup file would be deleted if there would not be command ECHO which results in just displaying the DEL command line.
For example the complete list of backup files is:
Y:\masters\Level2\Level3\Level4\Level5\Test1.bak
Y:\Folder2\masters\Level3\Test2.bak
Y:\Folder3\Level2\masters\Level4\Test3.bak
Y:\Folder4\Level2\Level3\Level4\Level5\Test4.bak
Y:\Folder5\Level2\Test5.bak
Y:\Folder6\Level2\Level3\Level4\Level5\Level6\Test6.bak
Y:\Folder7\masters\Test7.bak
The files deleted would be:
Y:\masters\Level2\Level3\Level4\Level5\Test1.bak
Y:\Folder2\masters\Level3\Test2.bak
Y:\Folder3\Level2\masters\Level4\Test3.bak
Y:\Folder7\masters\Test7.bak
And the files remaining would be:
Y:\Folder4\Level2\Level3\Level4\Level5\Test4.bak
Y:\Folder5\Level2\Test5.bak
Y:\Folder6\Level2\Level3\Level4\Level5\Level6\Test6.bak
Then use in your batch file:
forfiles /P "Y:\" /S /D -1096 /M *.bak /C "C:\Temp\DeleteBackup.bat #PATH"
It is of course possible to modify DeleteBackup.bat to check if directory in second directory hierarchy level is masters.
#echo off
for /F "tokens=3 delims=\" %%I in ("%~1") do if /I "%%I" == "masters" ECHO del "%~1"
This code would delete from the complete list above the files:
Y:\Folder2\masters\Level3\Test2.bak
Y:\Folder7\masters\Test7.bak
And the files remaining would be:
Y:\masters\Level2\Level3\Level4\Level5\Test1.bak
Y:\Folder3\Level2\masters\Level4\Test3.bak
Y:\Folder4\Level2\Level3\Level4\Level5\Test4.bak
Y:\Folder5\Level2\Test5.bak
Y:\Folder6\Level2\Level3\Level4\Level5\Level6\Test6.bak
Robert Chizmadia Jr. asked in an already deleted comment:
Is it possible to use GOTO instead of calling another batch file on FORFILES command line?
The answer on this additional question:
FORFILES is not an internal command of cmd.exe like FOR. It is a console application stored in directory %SystemRoot%\System32 if used version of Windows has it pre-installed at all.
The command to execute as specified after FORFILES option /C must be an executable or script. That is the reason why cmd /C is always used when an internal command of Windows command interpreter cmd.exe like DEL should be executed by FORFILES whereby the really complete command would be %SystemRoot%\System32\cmd.exe /C.
So it is not possible to use a command like GOTO in FORFILES command as there is no executable or script with name GOTO.
Also GOTO in a FOR loop exits the loop and therefore interpreting of command lines of batch files continues on another position in batch file.
However, it is possible to use the same batch file for the file path evaluation and backup file deletion as used to run FORFILES command.
Example 1 with batch file not expecting any parameter for default operation:
#echo off
if not "%~1" == "" (
for /F "tokens=3 delims=\" %%I in ("%~1") do if /I "%%I" == "masters" ECHO del "%~1"
goto :EOF
)
%SystemRoot%\System32\forfiles.exe /P "Y:\" /S /D -1096 /M *.bak /C "%~f0 #PATH"
If this batch file is executed with an argument, it runs the FOR loop written to check if second directory in file path is masters and delete this file in this case after removing ECHO. Otherwise on starting the batch file without any parameter the batch file runs the FORFILES executable.
Example 2 with batch file expecting 1 or more parameters for default operation:
#echo off
if "%~1" == "#Delete:Backup#" (
for /F "tokens=3 delims=\" %%I in ("%~2") do if /I "%%I" == "masters" ECHO del "%~2"
goto :EOF
)
rem Other commands processing the parameters.
%SystemRoot%\System32\forfiles.exe /P "Y:\" /S /D -1096 /M *.bak /C "%~f0 #Delete:Backup# #PATH"
rem More commands executed after the deletion of the backup files.
This is nearly the same as example 1 with the difference that if first parameter used on running the batch file is case-sensitive the string #Delete:Backup#, the batch file expects as second parameter the name of a backup file with full path being deleted if second directory in file path is masters.
Like in all batch code examples the command ECHO must be removed before del command also in this code example to really execute the deletion of the backup files.
For understanding the used commands and how they work, open a command prompt window, execute there the following commands, and read entirely all help pages displayed for each command very carefully.
echo /?
for /?
forfiles /?
goto /?
if /?
set /?
I am a newbie to windows batch scripting. I have researched through the web and the site and tried out the solutions but none seem to give me the desired results.
This is what I want to achieve:
Search for files in a folder using a specific filename
show found files
Check the found files if they are older than 1 day
If true,delete those files
Else return message(Found files not older than 1 day)
From my research I was able to write a batch code that searches for file using a string, but unable to do step 2,3,4 and 5.
Kindly assist.
Here is my batch code:
#echo off & setlocal
set "MySearchString=Scheduled_error"
for /r %%a in (*) do for /f "delims=" %%i in ('echo("%%~na" ^| findstr /i "%MySearchString%"') do echo del "%%~fa"
Seems like a perfect task for FORFILES!
forfiles /p c:\SomePath\ /s /m *.* /c "cmd /c echo #path" will show you all files older than one day. You can modify the filter replacing *.* with the file name you are looking for.
To delete these files simply replace echo #path with del /y #path and add the /d -1 parameter:
forfiles /p c:\SomePath /s /m *.* /d -1 /c "cmd /c del /y #path"
The age of the files to delete is specified with the /d -1 switch where -1 means 1 day and older.
Have a need where we need to delete zip files that exist under a specific folder at 100 days old. All other zip files in the other folders, we can delete that are 30 days old. This would be easy if the files were a specific name, unfortunately we can only do this by folder name.
In the end result we will be using one of these techniques with FORFILES as we don't have to do a lot of logic programming in script.
Searched and did find how to do this and works OK, but the processing of the script is very slow.. Pretty much at this point, everything in the "NOT" somefolder condition is what takes quite a while to complete. Have done this with VBScript and PowerShell, but really want to get back to Batch Scripting for this.
BAT script to search directory for folders that match an input name
and as dbenham admits, again this is very slow. Also, did not like the fact that it does not show all folders in the "not" condition for the ones it does not find
He also states, that if you want to do extensive file/folder searching redirecting to a output file, maybe the best solution
This does work, but does not show the "not found" or the folders it would list..
dir /s /a-d c:\windows\*system32* >nul && (echo found it) || (echo not found)
This works to find all folders with system32 on a drive
dir /b /ad /s "c:\system32"
This works to look for folders that DO HAVE system32 within the results which are pretty quick too
FOR /f "tokens=*" %%G IN ('dir /b /ad /s c:\ ^| findstr /I /C:"system32"') DO echo %%G
We want to show all folders that DO NOT HAVE system32 within and in testing and redirecting to result.txt file, it created a 11.9MB file and will take quite a while to complete especially on a whole drive
FOR /f "tokens=*" %%G IN ('dir /b /ad /s c:\ ^| findstr /I /V /C:"system32"') DO echo %%G
How do I search for the directory of a file given its name using a batch script?
Not quite sure about this one
for /r c:\ %%F in (system32) if exist "%%F" echo %%~dpF
Playing around we get
For /F %%A IN('dir /s /a-d "c:\windows\*system32*") do && (echo found it) || (echo not found)
Are there any other ideas or Suggestions out there?
This will search in c:\files and below, and delete zip files by the following criteria:
In the folder called Special folder it will delete them if they are 100 days or older
otherwise it will delete them if they are 30 days or older.
Any zip file in the folders below the Special folder will be deleted at 30 days and older.
Test it before use.
#echo off
for /r "c:\files" %%a in (*.zip) do (
for %%b in ("%%~dpa\.") do (
if /i "%%~nxb"=="Special folder" (
forfiles /p "%%~dpa." /m "%%~nxa" /d -100 /c "cmd /c del #path"
) else (
forfiles /p "%%~dpa." /m "%%~nxa" /d -30 /c "cmd /c del #path"
)
)
)
pause