Windows – PowerShell Delete Directory Based off Date in Name of Folder

powershellscriptingwindowswindows-server-2008

I recently put together a PowerShell script that creates directories named by date in the following format "yyyyMMddHHmm"

What I have been trying to do is figure out how I can go back through and have the script (or just make a new one) automatically delete any directories that are more than three days old. I would like to be able to pull the name of the folder (as in read the date in the format above) and have that be the determining factor but I am unsure as to where I would even start with this one. I guess knowing what the steps are so that I could break it down would be helpful.

Anyone ever try something like this before with PowerShell?

Best Answer

How about...

# Find today's date and calculate 3 days ago:
$today = get-date -DisplayHint date
$threeDaysAgo = $today.AddDays(-3)

# Get the folder list
$folders = (gci "c:\somwhere\" | where-object {$_.PSIsContainer -eq $True})

foreach ($f in $folders) {

    # Parse the date from the folder name text and turn into a date object
    $folderdate = get-date -year $f.Name.substring(0,4) -month $f.Name.substring(4,2) -day $f.Name.substring(6,2)

    # compare and do stuff
    if ($folderdate -lt $threeDaysAgo) { 
        write-host $f.Name
        # do delete here if needed
    }
}

You will need to adjust to taste, and work out if you need directory removal, or content deletion, or more, but that should do for the date part, anyway.

Related Solutions

PowerShell and Active Directory User Management

The base algorithm of what you're looking for looks something like this (according to me, anyway):

Enumerate all of the group with the right prefix.
Recursively follow their GroupMembers to enumerate any nested groups in them.
1. Once you get a group with no groups as members, stop recursing.
Take the list of users, for each user
1. Enumerate their Group Memberships
2. If any have the right prefix, remove them from it.
3. If any of the remaining groups are in the list of groups enumerated in the previous major step, remove them from that one too.

Now for actual code-like things.

Enumerating all groups with a prefix (untested, there will be bugs):

$RecurseList=dsquery group -name "abc-*"
$TargetList=$RecurseList
foreach $Grp in $RecurseList {
    # Now get the members of that group, do not expand
    $GrpMembers=dsget group "$Grp" -members
    foreach ($Member in $GrpMembers) {
        $isGroup=dsget group $Member
        if ($isGroup.dn -eq $Member) {
            $TargetList.add("$Member")
            RecurseIntoGroup($isGroup.dn)
        }
    }
}

Then when it comes time to talk the CSV list, get the membership of the user, and check to see if that group exists in $TargetList above. If so, remove it.

This is a heck of a lot of work to go through when removing just one user from potentially thousands of groups, but if you're doing a LOT of these then having the pre-built list will save you time.

If you only need to do it for a few users (say, 10 or so), you can walk back up the tree.

$UserGroups = dsquery user -name $Username -memberof
foreach ($uGroup in $UserGroups) {
    if (isConcerning($uGroup)) {
        $ConcerningGroups.add("$uGroup")
    }
}

function isConcerning {
param ($uGroup)

$parentGroups=dsget group $uGroup -memberOf
$found=$False
foreach ($pg in $parentGroup) {
    if ($parentGroup.startswith("abc-")) {
    return($true)
    $found=$true
    } else {
        $concerning=isConcerning($pg)
        if ($concerning) {
            return($true)
            $found=$true
        } 
    }
}
if (-not $found) {
    return($False)
}

And then remove the concerning groups as needed.

Powershell – How to import a text file into powershell and email it, formatted as HTML

you can try mine which works for me. You need to set all the variables, which should all self-documenting.

$body = "$(cat $file)"

send-MailMessage -SmtpServer $smtpserver -To $to -From $from -Subject $subject -Body $body -BodyAsHtml -Priority high

Best Answer

Related Solutions

PowerShell and Active Directory User Management

Powershell – How to import a text file into powershell and email it, formatted as HTML

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