Powershell Script to Copy Files to new Destination

Question

I'm using the below powershell script to move files from $Source to $Destination based on a date range. During testing, it's moving all of files within a directory that may have been updated within the date range, but I only require the updated or new files with the Directory/Subdirectory. I like how it's working, except for copying everything.

Any thoughts on how the script can can be tweaked?

$source = "C:\Documents and Settings"
$destination = "C:\Documents and Settings\Test"
[datetime]$start = '2/18/2021 11:00:00'
[datetime]$end = '2/18/2021 11:15:00'

 #Prod
 dir $source | %{ dir $_.FullName | ?{ $_.LastWriteTime -gt $start-and $_.LastWriteTime -lt $end } | 
 Copy-Item -Destination $destination -Recurse -Force }

Answer 1

I think what you probably need to do, if you're staying in Powershell and not using something like Robocopy to sync the folders, would be to push the path recursion up a level and then check a file at a time:

1. Get-ChildItem -Recurse on the source path
2. ForEach-Object on the result
3. Test-Path on the destination (doing a Replace of $source to $destination in the path)
4. Copy-Item from $source to $destination where the file doesn't exist or the LastFileWrite property is newer at the source path

Answer 2

In Posh, you filter as far left for faster results.

$source = "C:\Documents and Settings"
$destination = "C:\Documents and Settings\Test"
[datetime]$start = '2/18/2021 11:00:00'
[datetime]$end = '2/18/2021 11:15:00'

Get-ChildItem -Path $source -Recurse | Where-Object { $_.lastwriteTime -le $start -lt $end } | ForEach-Object -Process { Copy-Item -Path $_.FullName -Destination $destination -Force }

You're doing redundant work when you pipe another dir down the line.