Adding multiple attachments to email with paths from txt file via powershell

Question

Using powershell I want to scan a folder containing several txt-files (backup logfiles) and in case of an error create an email with the specific txt-files containing the error messages attached to the mail.

at the moment I identify the logfiles and write their path to a seperate txt-file.

Get-ChildItem $pfad -Filter *Error*.txt -Recurse | Select-String "Error occured" | Select-Object -expandproperty Path | Out-File -FilePath $filelist

I get a txt file containing this (no headers, no blank lines):

D:\Share\test2\Neues TextdokumentError.txt
D:\Share\test2\Testfile fbibgfwErroriebgfvibfvsbvf full.txt

Then I want to create an e-mail and attach the files from that seperate txt-file.

$logfiles = Get-Content $filelist

ForEach($log in $logfiles)
  {
  Write-Host “Attaching File :- ” $log
  $attachment = New-Object System.Net.Mail.Attachment –ArgumentList $log
  $msg.Attachments.Add($attachment)
  }

This is the result I keep getting:

Attaching File :-  D:\Share\test2\Neues TextdokumentError.txt
Es ist nicht möglich, eine Methode für einen Ausdruck aufzurufen, der den NULL hat.
In C:\test\Unbenannt1.ps1:43 Zeichen:3
+   $msg.Attachments.Add($attachment)
+   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    + CategoryInfo          : InvalidOperation: (:) [], RuntimeException
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : InvokeMethodOnNull

Attaching File :-  D:\Share\test2\Testfile fbibgfwErroriebgfvibfvsbvf full.txt
Es ist nicht möglich, eine Methode für einen Ausdruck aufzurufen, der den NULL hat.
In C:\test\Unbenannt1.ps1:43 Zeichen:3
+   $msg.Attachments.Add($attachment)
+   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    + CategoryInfo          : InvalidOperation: (:) [], RuntimeException
    + FullyQualifiedErrorId : InvokeMethodOnNull

In english the error means: "It is not possible to call a method for an expression that has the NULL."

The shown paths are correct, the files are there and they have content.

Thanks for your help!

Answer 1

Your file paths appear to have spaces in them. What happens if you put "$log" in quotes when you define $attachment ?

Better solution: to avoid all that fussing around with parsing strings out of text files, don't output your file list to text. Just use the file system objects.

$logfiles = Get-ChildItem $pfad -Filter *Error*.txt -Recurse | Select-String "Error occured" -List | Select Path

(Not tested, so check the command returns the files you're looking for)