Powershell: Move all files except most recently modified? - powershell

Question

Trying to simplify one of my archiving tasks, but I'm stumped on how to go about it. Basically, I just want Powershell to search a folder for files, and move all but the most recently modified (by LastWriteTime) to a backup folder.
I've searched around for solutions to this but every answer I've come across looks for the oldest file or depends on a specific file-naming convention to work.
Basically I want it to look at this this:
E:\ProjectFolder1\EDLs\File1.prproj (modified six days ago)
E:\ProjectFolder1\EDLs\File2.prproj (modified six hours ago)
E:\ProjectFolder1\EDLs\File3.prproj (modified six seconds ago)
Identify File3.prproj as the one that's most up-to-date, and move all the other files in the directory to another folder:
E:\Deep Storage\ProjectFolder1\EDLs\File1.prproj
E:\Deep Storage\ProjectFolder1\EDLs\File2.prproj
I know how to do everything except get it to compare the LastWriteTimes. Is there a way do get PS to do this?
EDIT with code sample
Get-ChildItem $sourceDir -Include $search -Recurse | Sort-Object LastWriteTime -Descending | Select-Object -Skip 1 | `
foreach{
$targetFile = $targetDir + $_.FullName.SubString($sourceDir.Length);
New-Item -ItemType File -Path $targetFile -Force;
Move-Item $_.FullName -destination $targetFile -Force
}
EDIT with functional code:
$sourceDir = "E:\Test1\EDLs\"
$targetDir = "E:\Deep Storage\Test1\EDLs\"
$search = "*.prproj"
Get-ChildItem $sourceDir -Recurse -Directory | ForEach-Object {
$files = $_ | Get-ChildItem -File -Filter $search
if($files.Count -lt 2) {
return
}
$newPath = Join-Path $targetDir -ChildPath $_.FullName.Substring($sourceDir.Length)
$null = New-Item $newPath -ItemType Directory -Force
$files | Sort-Object LastWriteTime -Descending | Select-Object -Skip 1 |
Move-Item -Destination $newPath -Verbose -WhatIf
}
EDIT to show actual syntax for operating environment:
$sourceDir = "E:\Projects\Current\EDLs"
$targetDir = "E:\Deep Storage\Projects\Current\EDLs"
$search = "*.prproj"
Get-ChildItem $sourceDir -Directory | ForEach-Object {
# search only for files only 1 level under this folder
$files = Get-ChildItem $sourceDir -Filter *.prproj
# if there are at least 2 files here
if($files.Count -ge 2) {
# we dont need to create new folder here since these will go directly under
# destination folder so, we can just sort and skip first as in previous logic
$files | Sort-Object LastWriteTime -Descending | Select-Object -Skip 1 |
# then move them
Move-Item -Destination $targetDir
}

Answer 1

Ultimately the answer was a lot simpler than I thought it would be:
$sourceDir="E:\Test1\Test2"
# Where your files are
$targetDir="E:\Deep Storage\Test1\Test2"
# Where you want to send them
$search="*.ext"
# If applicable, what type of file you want to look for
Get-ChildItem -Path $sourceDir -Filter $search | Sort-Object |
Select-Object -SkipLast 1 | Move-Item -Destination $targetDir -Verbose -WhatIf
I use environment variables for my workflow so mine looks a little different, but this should be useful for anyone in the same situation.