Locating all subdirectories matching a string or partial string

Question

I basically need to set a variable to a folder path without knowing the full path.

My issue is I need to find a directory called "DirA" for example. But this directory could either be located in "DirB\" or "DirB\DirC" and sometimes the directory names that they could be contained in are not the same.

I know the first portion of the directory path will be the same regardless so i thought of using a -recurse filter to the folder name but sometimes the directory i'm looking for isn't named quite like the one that is usually expected, sometimes an extra letter on the end.

Would it be possible to do something like...

$MyVariable = Get-ChildItem D:\Data\Dir1 -Recurse | Where-Object {$_.name -like "name"} -Directory |
% { $_.fullname }

Any help is greatly appreciated!

score 34 · Accepted Answer · edited Mar 23 '23 at 02:28

34

Try something like this:

$BaseDir = "C:\Dir1"
$NameToFind = "\DirA"

$MyVariable = Get-ChildItem $BaseDir -Recurse | Where-Object { $_.PSIsContainer -and $_.Name.EndsWith($NameToFind)}

This should go through all the directories in the tree, starting at C:\Dir1 and return the directory object DirA back to you.

If you only want results one level deep remove the -Recurse.

If you only need the path of the directory, just use:

$MyVariable.FullName

edited Mar 23 '23 at 02:28

Jeremy Thompson

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answered Mar 08 '16 at 14:45

Mark Oxley

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You Sir are amazing! i changed it a little because it was more likely to find the start so "$_.Name.EndsWith" and removed the backslash from $NameToFind – Dewi Jones Mar 08 '16 at 15:00

Matt · Answer 2 · 2016-03-09T16:23:59.333

10

You don't need to post process this with Where-Object. -Filter can already get this for you. If you have at least PowerShell 3.0 then you can remove Where-object in its entirety.

(Get-ChildItem -Path D:\Data\Dir1 -Filter "*DirA*" -Recurse -Directory).Fullname

That will return all directories under the Path that have the exact name of DirA. If you need partial matches then just use simple wildcards: -Filter "Dir*some"

If running PowerShell 2.0 then you can do the following.

Get-ChildItem -Path D:\Data\Dir1 -Filter "*DirA*" -Recurse | Where-Object {$_.PSIsContainer} | Select-Object -ExpandProperty Fullname

edited Mar 09 '16 at 16:23

answered Mar 08 '16 at 15:18

Matt

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The problem is that this needs to be able to run on various OS' so needed to be v2 compatible "/ – Dewi Jones Mar 09 '16 at 16:17
@dewi Added the 2.0 equivalent of what I suggested. Basically let filter do as much as it can to relieve post processing. – Matt Mar 09 '16 at 16:24
This is much faster – ferics2 Oct 29 '17 at 01:30

score 4 · Answer 3 · edited Aug 23 '18 at 14:55

Hi find the below script it should work correct me in case if it's wrong,

$rootFolder = "D:\Data" ##Mention the root folder name here###

$folderItems = (Get-ChildItem $rootFolder) 

$subfolderslist = (Get-ChildItem $rootFolder -recurse | Where-Object {$_.PSIsContainer -eq $True -and $_.Name -like "*2018-08*"} | Sort-Object)

foreach ($curfolder in $subfolderslist)
{

    #Write-Host 'Folder Name '$curfolder  yyyy-mm-dd
    $subFolderItems = (Get-ChildItem $curfolder.FullName) 

    foreach($item in $subFolderItems)
    {

      $currentfile=$rootFolder+"\"+$curfolder+"\"+$item
      #Write-Host 'file path '$mfilepath
      Write-Host " "

     if ((Get-Item $currentfile ).length -gt 3mb)
      { 
        Write-Host "File size greater than 3 MB hence "$true
      }
      else 
       {
         Write-Host "File size less than 3 MB hence "$false
       }

    } 


}

score 3 · Answer 4 · answered Mar 08 '16 at 14:48

You can use Get-ChildItem and recurse like you are doing, throw in a where-object to grab directories only, and then also use a name filter. Using your example of trying to find DirA (but it may have letters after it) that will always be somewhere inside Dir1, this query should work:

$MyVariable = Get-Childitem D:\Data\Dir1 -recurse | Where-Object {$_.PSIsContainer -and $_.name -like "*DirA*" | Select-Object -expandproperty fullname

score 2 · Answer 5 · answered Sep 11 '21 at 17:00

2

You could do it in this way in Powershell 3.0+

$MyVariable = (dir -r -Filter "DirA*" -Path "D:\Data\Dir1").FullName

"dir -r" it's an alias of "Get-ChildItem -Directory -Recurse"

answered Sep 11 '21 at 17:00

crisc2000

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Locating all subdirectories matching a string or partial string

5 Answers5