I have a batch of files with names like: 78887_16667_MR12_SMITH_JOHN_713_1.pdf
I need to retain the first three sets of numbers and remove everything between the third "_" and "_1.pdf".
So this: 78887_16667_MR12_SMITH_JOHN_713_1.pdf
Becomes this: 78887_16667_MR12_1.pdf
Ideally, I'd like to be able to just use the 3rd "_" as the break as the third set of numbers sometimes includes 3 characters, sometimes 4 characters (like the example) and other times, 5 characters.
If I used something like this:
Get-ChildItem Default_*.pdf | Rename-Item -NewName {$_.name -replace...
...and then I'm stuck: can I state that everything from the 3rd "" and the 6th "" should be replaced with "" (nothing)? My understanding that I'd include ".Extension" to also save the extension, too.
You can use the -split operator to split your name into _-separated tokens, extract the tokens of interest, and then join them again with the -join operator:
PS> ('78887_16667_MR12_SMITH_JOHN_713_1.pdf' -split '_')[0..2 + -1] -join '_'
78887_16667_MR12_1.pdf
0..2 extracts the first 3 tokens, and -1 the last one (you could write this array of indices as 0, 1, 2, -1 as well).
Applied in the context of renaming files:
Get-ChildItem -Filter *.pdf | Rename-Item -NewName {
($_.Name -split '_')[0..2 + -1] -join '_'
} -WhatIf
Common parameter -WhatIf previews the rename operation; remove it to perform actual renaming.
mklement0 has given you a good and working answer. Here is another way to do it using a regex.
Get-ChildItem -Filter *.pdf |
ForEach-Object {
if ($_.Name -match '(.*?_.*?_.*?)_.*(_1.*)') {
Rename-Item -Path $_.FullName -NewName $($Matches[1..2] -join '') -WhatIf
}
}
Related
I have a series of files all named something like:
PRT14_WD_14220000_1.jpg
I need to add two zeroes after the last underscore and before the number so it looks like PRT14_WD_14220000_001.jpg
I've tried"
(dir) | rename-Item -new { $_.name -replace '*_*_*_','*_*_*_00' }
Appreciate any help.
The closest thing to what you attempted would be this. In regex, the wildcard is .*. And the parentheses do grouping to refer to later with the dollar sign numbers.
dir *.jpg | rename-Item -new { $_.name -replace '(.*)_(.*)_(.*)_','$1_$2_$3_00' } -whatif
What if: Performing the operation "Rename File" on target "Item: C:\users\admin\foo\PRT14_WD_14220000_1.jpg Destination: C:\users\admin\foo\PRT14_WD_14220000_001.jpg".
Ok, here's my take when you want the number with max two zeroes padding. $num has to be an integer for the .tostring() method I want.
dir *.jpg | rename-item -newname { $a,$b,$c,$num = $_.basename -split '_'
$num = [int]$num
$a + '_' + $b + "_" + $c + '_' + $num.tostring('000') + '.jpg'
} -whatif
the following presumes your last part of the .BaseName will always need two zeros added to it. what it does ...
fakes getting the fileinfo object that you get from Get-Item/Get-ChildItem
replace that with the appropriate cmdlet. [grin]
splits the .BaseName into parts using the _ as the split target
adds two zeros to the final part from the above split
merges the parts into a $NewBaseName
gets the .FullName and replaces the original BaseName with the $newBaseName
displays that new file name
you will still need to do your rename, but that is pretty direct. [grin]
here's the code ...
# fake getting a file info object
# in real life, use Get-Item or Get-ChildItem
$FileInfo = [System.IO.FileInfo]'PRT14_WD_14220000_1.jpg'
$BNParts = $FileInfo.BaseName.Split('_')
$BNParts[-1] = '00{0}' -f $BNParts[-1]
$NewBasename = $BNParts -join '_'
$NewFileName = $FileInfo.FullName.Replace($FileInfo.BaseName, $NewBaseName)
$NewFileName
output = D:\Data\Scripts\PRT14_WD_14220000_001.jpg
The -replace operator operates on regexes (regular expressions), not wildcard expressons such as * (by itself), which is what you're trying to use.
A conceptually more direct approach is to focus the replacement on the end of the string:
Get-ChildItem | # `dir` is a built-in alias for Get-ChildItem`
Rename-Item -NewName { $_.Name -replace '(?<=_)[^_]+(?=\.)', '00$&' } -WhatIf
Note: The -WhatIf common parameter in the command above previews the operation. Remove -WhatIf once you're sure the operation will do what you want.
(?<=_)[^_]+(?=\.) matches a nonempty run (+) of non-_ chars. ([^_]) preceded by _ ((?<=_) and followed by a literal . ((?=\.)), excluding both the preceding _ and the following . from what is captured by the match ((?<=...) and (?=...) are non-capturing look-around assertions).
In short: This matches and captures the characters after the last _ and before the start of the filename extension.
00$& replaces what was matched with 00, followed by what the match captured ($&).
In a follow-up comment you mention wanting to not just blindly insert 00, but to 0-left-pad the number after the last _ to 3 digits, whatever the number may be.
In PowerShell [Core] 6.1+, this can be achieved as follows:
Get-ChildItem |
Rename-Item -NewName {
$_.Name -replace '(?<=_)[^_]+(?=\.)', { $_.Value.PadLeft(3, '0') }
} -WhatIf
The script block ({ ... }) as the replacement operand receives each match as a Match instance stored in automatic variable $_, whose .Value property contains the captured text.
Calling .PadLeft(3, '0') on that captured text 0-left-pads it to 3 digits and outputs the result, which replaces the regex match at hand.
A quick demonstration:
PS> 'PRT14_WD_14220000_1.jpg' -replace '(?<=_)[^_]+(?=\.)', { $_.Value.PadLeft(3, '0') }
PRT14_WD_14220000_001.jpg # Note how '_1.jpg' was replaced with '_001.jpg'
In earlier PowerShell versions, you must make direct use of the .NET [regex] type's .Replace() method, which fundamentally works the same:
Get-ChildItem |
Rename-Item -NewName {
[regex]::Replace($_.Name, '(?<=_)[^_]+(?=\.)', { param($m) $m.Value.PadLeft(3, '0') })
} -WhatIf
I need to replace the time\date stamp that's included in the filename after 2nd underscore (needs to be in the same format yyyyMMddHHmmss)
example file: 123456_123456_20190716163001.xml
sometimes the file in question gets created with an additional character which invalidates the file, in this case I need to replace this with the current timestamp.
example: 123456_123456_current Timestamp here.xml
The file should never exceed 32 characters(including extension)
I found a script but it deletes everything after the 1st underscore not the 2nd and I'm struggling to find a way to replace the text with the current timestamp.
Get-ChildItem c:\test -Filter 123456_123456*.xml | Foreach-Object -Process {
$NewName = [Regex]::Match($_.Name,"^[^_]*").Value + '.xml' $_ | Rename-Item -NewName $NewName
}
timestamp after 2nd underscore to be updated to the current timestamp if original file exceeds 32 characters
123456_123456_current Timestamp here.xml
this takes advantage of the way a [fileinfo] object is structured. the .BaseName is easy to get to & use .Split() on. then one can use -join to put it back into one basename & finally add the extension onto the basename.
# fake reading in a file info object
# in real life, use Get-ChildItem or Get-Item
$FileObject = [System.IO.FileInfo]'123456_123456_current Timestamp here.xml'
$NewName = -join (($FileObject.BaseName.Split('_')[0,1] -join '_'), $FileObject.Extension)
$NewName
output = 123456_123456.xml
Sticking with the regex theme, you can do the following:
$CurrentTime = Get-Date -Format 'yyyyMMddHHmmss'
$RegexReplace = "(.*?_.*?_).*(\..*)"
Get-ChildItem c:\test -Filter 123456_123456*.xml |
Rename-Item -NewName {$_.Name -replace $RegexReplace,"`${1}$CurrentTime`${2}"}
If duplicate file names are a concern, you can build in an increment to $CurrentTime.
$CurrentTime = Get-Date -Format 'yyyyMMddHHmmss'
$RegexReplace = "(.*?_.*?_).*(\..*)"
Get-ChildItem c:\test -Filter 123456_123456*.xml |
Rename-Item -NewName {
$NewName = $_.Name -replace $RegexReplace,"`${1}$CurrentTime`${2}"
if (test-path $NewName) {
$CurrentTime = [double]$CurrentTime + 1
$NewName = $_.Name -replace $RegexReplace,"`${1}$CurrentTime`${2}"
}
$NewName
}
Explanation:
$RegexReplace contains the regex expression that will need to be matched for the ideal rename operation to happen. The regex mechanisms are explained below:
.*?_.*?_: Matches a minimal number of characters (lazy matching) followed by an underscore and then another minimal number of characters followed by an underscore.
.*: Greedily matches any characters
\.: Literally matches the dot character (.).
(): The parentheses here represent capture groups with the first set being 1 and the second set being 2. These are later referenced as ${1} and ${2} in the -replace operation.
Since Rename-Item -NewName supports delayed script binding, we can just pipe Get-ChildItem output directly to it. The current pipeline object is $_.
The -replace operation uses the variable $CurrentTime, which must be expanded in order for a successful outcome. For that reason, we use double quotes around the replacement. Since we do not want capture groups ${1} and ${2} expanded, we backtick escape them.
I have a few hundered PDF files that have text in their file names which need to be removed. Each of the file names have several underscores in their names depending on how long the file name is. My goal is to remove the text in that exists between the .pdf file extension and the last _.
For example I have:
AB_NAME_NAME_NAME_NAME_DS_123_EN_6.pdf
AC_NAME_NAME_NAME_DS_321_EN_10.pdf
AD_NAME_NAME_DS_321_EN_101.pdf
And would like the bold part to be removed to become:
AB_NAME_NAME_NAME_NAME_DS_123_EN.pdf
AC_NAME_NAME_NAME_DS_321_EN.pdf
AD_NAME_NAME_DS_321_EN.pdf
I am a novice at powershell but I have done some research and have found Powershell - Rename filename by removing the last few characters question helpful but it doesnt get me exactly what I need because I cannot hardcode the length of characters to be removed because they may different lengths (2-4)
Get-ChildItem 'C:\Path\here' -filter *.pdf | rename-item -NewName {$_.name.substring(0,$_.BaseName.length-3) + $_.Extension}
It seems like there may be a way to do this using .split or regex but I was not able to find a solution. Thanks.
You can use the LastIndexOf() method of the [string] class to get the index of the last instance of a character. In your case this should do it:
Get-ChildItem 'C:\Path\here' -filter *.pdf | rename-item -NewName { $_.BaseName.substring(0,$_.BaseName.lastindexof('_')) + $_.Extension }
Using the -replace operator with a regex enables a concise solution:
Get-ChildItem 'C:\Path\here' -Filter *.pdf |
Rename-Item -NewName { $_.Name -replace '_[^_]+(?=\.)' } -WhatIf
-WhatIf previews the renaming operation. Remove it to perform actual renaming.
_[^_]+ matches a _ character followed by one or more non-_ characters ([^-])
If you wanted to match more specifically by (decimal) digits only (\d), use _\d+ instead.
(?=\.) is a look-ahead assertion ((?=...)) that matches a literal . (\.), i.e., the start of the filename extension without including it in the match.
By not providing a replacement operand to -replace, it is implicitly the empty string that replaces what was matched, which effectively removes the last _-prefixed token before the filename extension.
You can make the regex more robust by also handling file names with "double" extensions; e.g., the above solution would replace filename a_bc.d_ef.pdf with a.c.pdf, i.e., perform two replacements. To prevent that, use the following regex instead:
$_.Name -replace '_[^_]+(?=\.[^.]+$)'
The look-ahead assertion now ensures that only the last extension matches: a literal . (\.) followed by one or more (+) characters other than literal . ([^.], a negated character set ([^...])) at the end of the string ($).
Just to show another alternative,
the part to remove from the Name is the last element from the BaseName splitted with _
which is a negative index from the split [-1]
Get-ChildItem 'C:\Path\here' -Filter *.pdf |%{$_.BaseName.split('_\d+')[-1]}
6
10
101
as the split removes the _ it has to be applied again to remove it.
Get-ChildItem 'C:\Path\here' -Filter *.pdf |
Rename-Item -NewName { $_.Name -replace '_'+$_.BaseName.split('_')[-1] } -whatif
EDIT a modified variant which splits the BaseName at the underscore
without removing the splitting character is using the -split operator and
a RegEx with a zero length lookahead
> Get-ChildItem 'C:\Path\here' -Filter *.pdf |%{($_.BaseName -split'(?=_\d+)')[-1]}
_6
_10
_101
Get-ChildItem 'C:\Path\here' -Filter *.pdf |
Rename-Item -NewName { $_.Name -replace ($_.BaseName -split'(?=_)')[-1] } -whatif
I have a working script that searches for files with a regular expression. The script returns 2 lines per file: the parent folder naùe, and the filename (matching the regex).
Get-ChildItem -Path "D:\test\" -Recurse -File |
Where-Object { $_.BaseName -match '^[0-9]+$' } |
ForEach-Object { $_.FullName -Split '\',-3,'SimpleMatch' } |
select -last 2 |
Out-File "D:\wim.txt"
A certain system needs to have the output on one line, concatenated with for example \ or a similar character. How can I achieve this please ?
Many thanks !
Get-ChildItem -Path D:\test -Recurse -File |
Where-Object { $_.BaseName -match '^[0-9]+$' } |
ForEach-Object { ($_.FullName -split '\\')[-2,-1] -join '\' } | #'
Out-File D:\wim.txt
($_.FullName -Split '\\')[-2,-1] extracts the last 2 components from the file path
and -join '\' joins them back together.
Note that, aside from the line-formatting issue, your original command does not work as intended, because | select -last 2 is applied to the overall output, not per matching file; thus, even if there are multiple matching files, you'll only ever get the parent directory and filename of the last matching file.
The command above therefore extracts the last 2 \-separated path components inside the ForEach-Object block, directly on the result of the -split operation, so that 2 (joined) components are returned per file.
As an aside, the -3 in $_.FullName -split '\', -3, 'SimpleMatch' does not extract the last 3 tokens; it is currently effectively treated the same as 0, meaning that all resulting tokens are returned; given that -split defaults to using regexes, and representing a literal \ requires escaping as \\, $_.FullName -split '\', -3, 'SimpleMatch' is the same as $_.FullName -split '\\', which is what the solution above uses.
Note that there is a green-lit -split enhancement that will give negative <Max-substrings> values new meaning in the future, applying the current positive-number logic analogously to the end of the input string; e.g, -3 would mean: return the last 2 components plus whatever is left of the input string before them (with the resulting tokens still reported from left to right).
I've been batch renaming .las files in powershell with a simple script:
cd "C:\Users\User\desktop\Folder"
Dir | Rename-Item -NewName {$_.name-replace "-", "" }
Dir | Rename-Item -NewName {$_.name-replace "_", "" }
Dir | Rename-Item -NewName {$_.BaseName+ "0.las"}
This has been working great, but I need to modify it to account for a different naming convention.
The files start out in this format: 123_45-67-890-12W_0
and get converted to 123456789012W00.las
Occasionally the number after the W will be non zero, and I need to carry that on as the last digit, eg. 123_45-67-890-12W_2 needs to go to 123456789012W02
I'm not sure how to use if statements and to select a specific digit in powershell format, which is how I would approach this problem. Does anyone have some ideas on how to go about this?
Thanks
You can use a regular expression to achieve this:
Get-ChildItem "C:\Users\User\desktop\Folder" | ForEach-Object {
#capture everything we need with regex
$newName = $_.Name -replace "(\d{3})_(\d{2})-(\d{2})-(\d{3})-(\d{2})(\w)_(\d)",'$1$2$3$4$5$6$7'
#insert 0 before last digit and append file extension
$newName = $newName.Insert(($newName.Length - 1), "0") + ".las"
#rename file
Rename-Item $_.FullName -NewName $newName
}
You can use the substring method to get all but the last character in the basename, then concatenate the zero, then use substring again to get the basename's last character, then finish off with the .las extension:
Dir | Rename-Item -NewName {($_.BaseName).substring(0,$_.BaseName.length - 1) + "0" + ($_.BaseName).substring($_.BaseName.length -1,1) + ".las"}
# ^^^^This gets everything but the last charcter^^^ ^^^^^^^^^^This gets the last character^^^^^^^^^^