Powershell Find all empty folders and subfolders in a given Folder name - powershell

Question

I´m trying to get a
a) list of all empty folders and subfolders if the folder is named "Archiv"
b) I´d like to delete all those empty folders. My current approch doesn´t check the subfolders.
It would be also great if the results would be exportet in a .csv =)
$TopDir = 'C:\Users\User\Test'
$DirToFind = 'Archiv'>$EmptyDirList = #(
Get-ChildItem -LiteralPath $TopDir -Directory -Recurse |
Where-Object {
#[System.IO.Directory]::GetFileSystemEntries($_.FullName).Count -eq 0
$_.GetFileSystemInfos().Count -eq 0 -and
$_.Name -match $DirToFind
}
).FullName
$EmptyDirList
Any ideas how to adjust the code? Thanks in advance

Answer 1

You need to reverse the order in which Get-ChildItem lists the items so you can remove using the deepest nested empty folder first.
$LogFile = 'C:\Users\User\RemovedEmptyFolders.log'
$TopDir = 'C:\Users\User\Test'
# first get a list of all folders below the $TopDir directory that are named 'Archiv' (FullNames only)
$archiveDirs = (Get-ChildItem -LiteralPath $TopDir -Filter 'Archiv' -Recurse -Directory -Force).FullName |
# sort on the FullName.Length property in Descending order to get 'deepest-nesting-first'
Sort-Object -Property Length -Descending
# next, remove all empty subfolders in each of the $archiveDirs
$removed = foreach ($dir in $archiveDirs) {
(Get-ChildItem -LiteralPath $dir -Directory -Force) |
# sort on the FullName.Length property in Descending order to get 'deepest-nesting-first'
Sort-Object #{Expression = {$_.FullName.Length}} -Descending |
ForEach-Object {
# if this folder is empty, remove it and output its FullName for the log
if (#($_.GetFileSystemInfos()).Count -eq 0) {
$_.FullName
Remove-Item -LiteralPath $_.FullName -Force
}
}
# next remove the 'Archiv' folder that is now possibly empty too
if (#(Get-ChildItem -LiteralPath $dir -Force).Count -eq 0) {
# output this folders fullname and delete
$dir
Remove-Item -LiteralPath $dir -Force
}
}
$removed | Set-Content -Path $LogFile -PassThru # write your log file. -PassThru also writes the output on screen

Answer 2

Not sure a CSV is needed, I think a simple text file will suffice as it's just a list.
Anyway, here's (although not the most elegant) a solution which will also delete "nested empty directories". Meaning if a directory only contains empty directorIS, it will also get deleted
$TopDir = "C:\Test" #Top level directory to scan
$EmptyDirListReport = "C:\EmptyDirList.txt" #Text file location to store a file with the list of deleted directorues
if (Test-Path -Path $EmptyDirListReport -PathType Leaf)
{
Remove-Item -Path $EmptyDirListReport -Force
}
$EmptyDirList = ""
Do
{
$EmptyDirList = Get-ChildItem -Path $TopDir -Recurse | Where-Object -FilterScript { $_.PSIsContainer } | Where-Object -FilterScript { ((Get-ChildItem -Path $_.FullName).Count -eq 0) } | Select-Object -ExpandProperty FullName
if ($EmptyDirList)
{
$EmptyDirList | Out-File -FilePath $EmptyDirListReport -Append
$EmptyDirList | Remove-Item -Force
}
} while ($EmptyDirList)

Answer 3

This should do the trick, should works with nested too.
$result=(Get-ChildItem -Filter "Archiv" -Recurse -Directory $topdir | Sort-Object #{Expression = {$_.FullName.Length}} -Descending | ForEach-Object {
if ((Get-ChildItem -Attributes d,h,a $_.fullname).count -eq 0){
$_
rmdir $_.FullName
}
})
$result | select Fullname |ConvertTo-Csv |Out-File $Logfile

Answer 4

You can do this with a one-liner:
> Get-ChildItem -Recurse dir -filter Archiv |
Where-Object {($_ | Get-ChildItem).count -eq 0} |
Remove-Item
Although, for some reason, if you have nested Archiv files like Archiv/Archiv, you need to run the line several times.