Copy files using wildcard

[AquaNut]

Hi All,

I am trying to copy specific files from a share to a local temp folder on a specified date (not yet implemented)

The trouble I am seeing is that I am trying to use a wildcard within the files as they have random numbers after set characters to which it errors with illegal characters in path.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

        private void WedArrears()
        {
            string nLine = Environment.NewLine;

            DateTime date = DateTime.Now;

            if (date.DayOfWeek.Equals(DayOfWeek.Wednesday))
            {
                string dpPath = @Properties.Settings.Default.DPPath; // target directory    c:\Temp
                string wedTemp = @Properties.Settings.Default.WedTmpFiles; //source directory  \\yhn\spool$\houlive\hou_output

                try
                {
                    string[] patterns = new string[] { "GA1*.rtf", "GA2*.rtf", "INTW*.rtf", "LET1*.rtf", "RA2*.rtf", "RA3*.rtf", "A4*.rtf", "RA5*.rtf" };
                    var matches = patterns.SelectMany(pat => Directory.GetFiles(wedTemp)
                        .Where(path => System.Text.RegularExpressions.Regex.Match(wedTemp, pat).Success));


                    foreach (string file in patterns)
                    {
                        string dest = dpPath + file;
                        string source = wedTemp + file;
                        File.Copy(source, dest);

                        textResults.AppendText(file + nLine);
                    }
                }
                catch (IOException ex)
                {
                    textResults.AppendText(ex + nLine);
                }

                MessageBox.Show("Successfully Copied Files");
            }
        }

[tinstaafl]

One thing I noticed line 19 should probably use matches not patterns.

For searching the directory with multiple search terms straight LINQ would work well:

                string[] patterns = new string[] { "GA1", "GA2", "INTW", "LET1", "RA2", "RA3", "A4", "RA5" };
                var matches = (from string f in Directory.EnumerateFiles(wedTemp)
                               from string s in patterns
                               where f.Contains(s) 
                               select Path.GetFileName(f)).ToList();

                foreach(string file in matches)
                {
                    string dest = dpPath + @"\" + file;
                    string source = wedTemp + @"\" + file;
                    File.Copy(source, dest,true);
                    textResults.AppendText(file + nLine);
                }

This compares each file name with all the patterns you're checking against and returns a collection of just the file names, and no path info. This means that to copy these files you have to build the path again

[AquaNut]

Thanks Tinstaffle, just added your code and ran the app and it copied the following file types

HRA218_35.rec.Z
HRA218_41.tra.Z
HRA218_63.rif.Z
HRA218_60.hea.Z
HRA218_25.bac.Z
HRA218_15.hea

Total of over 750 files

I needed just .rtf files starting with what I have in the patterns string array.

Did find it strange that there was only a match on RA2 though.

[AquaNut]

Hi Tinstaffle, found out the file name is case sensitive :) so it brings everything back plus more, just need to filter on brining the .rtf files only.

Possibly the wrong way to go around it but copy all from a given day and delete all but the .rtf files?

Ken

[AquaNut]

Have got a little bit further, can now get only .rtf file but also I am getting all rtf files with a modified date of every Wednesday.

How am I able to get the current day only?

Thanks again for the help

{
                    //string dateStart = "04/12/2013 00:00:01 AM";
                    //string dateEnd = "04/12/2013 59:59:59 AM";

                    string[] patterns = new string[] { "ga1_", "ga2_", "intw_", "let1_", "ra2_", "ra3_", "ra4_", "ra5_"};
                    var matches = (from string f in Directory.EnumerateFiles(wedTemp)
                                   from string s in patterns
                                   where f.Contains(s)
                                   where File.GetLastWriteTime(f).DayOfWeek.Equals(DayOfWeek.Wednesday)
                                   where Path.GetExtension(f) == @".rtf" 
                                   select Path.GetFileName(f)).ToList();

                    foreach (string file in matches)
                    {
                        string dest = dpPath + @"\" + file;
                        string source = wedTemp + @"\" + file;
                        File.Copy(source, dest, true);
                        textResults.AppendText(file + nLine);
                    }
                }

[tinstaafl]

See if something like this helps:

                var matches = (from string f in Directory.EnumerateFiles(wedTemp)
                               from string s in patterns
                               where Path.GetExtension(f) == ".rtf" &&  f.StartsWith(s) && File.GetLastWriteTime(f).Date == DateTime.Now.Date
                               select Path.GetFileName(f)).ToList();

The order in which you filter the filenames is important. C# uses shortcutting, which means that as soon as it gets a wrong condition it stops processing that statement. Since you have other files with similar naming patterns I changed one of the conditions to check using StartsWith instead.