Windows batch script to search for specific files to delete

Question

I need help converting the following Linux/Mac commands into a Windows batch script.

find / -regex ``^.*/Excel_[a-z]*.xls'' -delete 2>/dev/null
find / -regex ``^.*/presentation[0-9]*[a-z]*.ppt'' -delete 2>/dev/null

Basically using regular expressions, I need to find any of the .xls/.ppt files (in the format above) in a given Windows box and delete them.

Sorry, I'm new to Windows batch files.

Answer 1

You really don't explain what your hieroglypics mean.

In a batch file,

@echo off
setlocal
dir /s "c:\local root\Excel_*.xls"

would show all of the files matching starting Excel_ with extension .xls

(and if that's what you want, simply replacing dir with del would delete them; adding >nul would suppress messages; adding 2>nul suppresses error messages)

If you want files starting Excel_ then followed by any alphas-only, then

for /f "delims=" %%a in ('dir /b /s /a-d Excel_*.xls ^| findstr /E /R "\\Excel_[a-z]*\.xls" ') do echo "%%a"

The dir produces a directory list in /b (basic) form (ie. filename-only) /s - with subdirectories (which attaches the full directory name) and the /ad suppresses directorynames. This is piped to findstr to filter out the required filenames. The result is assigned to %%a line-by-line, and the delims= means "don't tokenise the data"

should show you all the files matching that criterion - but it would be case-sensitive; add /i to the findstr switches to make it case-insensitive. (/r means "regex" within findstr 's restricted implementation; /e means "ends" - I tend to use these over $ ) The \\\\ in intended to implement escaped \\ to ensure the filename match is complete (ie do't find "some_prefixExcel_whatever.xls) - I'll leave what \\. is intended to do to your imagination...

(again, change echo to del to delete and add in the redirection palaver if required)

And the other regex - well, follow the bouncing ball. It would appear you want .ppt files with names starting presentation followed by a possible series of numerics then by a series of alphabetics. I'd suggest

findstr /e /r "\\presentation[0-9]*[a-z]*\.ppt" for that task.

Answer 2

Plain Batch can't do this task. But you could make use of tools like findstr which come with Windows and support Regex.

This line can be executed from CMD and deletes all files in the current folder which match the RegEx:

for /f "eol=: delims=" %F in ('findstr /r "MY_REGEX_HERE"') do del "%F"

So try to get your expected results by playing around with this command. If your fine with the output/results, you can embed this line in your batch script. (Be careful, when embedding this line in batchscript you have to double the percentage signs!)

for /f "eol=: delims=" %%F in ('findstr /r "MY_REGEX_HERE"') do del "%%F"

Answer 3

Use PowerShell.

get-childitem | where-object { $_.Name -match '<put a regex here>' } | remove-item

get-childitem returns file system objects, and the where-object filter selects only those file system objects whose name property matches a regular expression. These filtered items are then passed through the pipeline to remove-item .

There is good information about the PowerShell pipeline in the about_pipelines help topic, which you can read using the following command:

help about_pipelines

Answer 4

Here a small batch to do what you are looking for:

@echo off

set /p dirpath=Where are your files ? 
:: set dirpath=%~dp0 :: if you want to use the directory where the batch file is
set /p pattern=Which pattern do you wanna search (use regex: *.xml e.g.) : 
:: combinason /s /b for fullpath+filename, /b for filename
for /f %%A in ('dir /s /b "%dirpath%\%pattern%" ^| find /v /c ""') do set cnt=%%A
echo File count = %cnt%

call :MsgBox "Do you want to delete all %pattern% in %dirpath%? %cnt% files found"  "VBYesNo+VBQuestion" "Click yes to delete the %pattern%"
if errorlevel 7 (
    echo NO - quit the batch file
) else if errorlevel 6 (
    echo YES - delete the files
    :: set you regex, %%i in batch file, % in cmd
    for /f "delims=" %%a in ('dir /s /b "%dirpath%\%pattern%"') do del "%%a"
)

:: avoid little window to popup 
exit /b

:: VBS code for the yesNo popup
:MsgBox prompt type title
    setlocal enableextensions
    set "tempFile=%temp%\%~nx0.%random%%random%%random%vbs.tmp"
    >"%tempFile%" echo(WScript.Quit msgBox("%~1",%~2,"%~3") & cscript //nologo //e:vbscript "%tempFile%"
    set "exitCode=%errorlevel%" & del "%tempFile%" >nul 2>nul
    endlocal & exit /b %exitCode%