Folder (and containing files) Sorting Software?

[Da_maniaC]

Hey,

I am looking for a piece of software that allows me to sort a bunch of folders automatically due to my specified criteria.

To name an example:

- I have 1 huge folder that contains 1000 subfolders which all contain a text file that specifies a month.

- So i want the tool to be able to look at that month then grab the entire folder that contained the file and

copy it to a folder i specified.

Does anyone know of a program of method that can do this?

[Hb_Kai]

How do you mean "sort"?

What do you want to do with the text files? I've never heard of a application/program which arranges files and folders, but if you're trying to sort them alphabetically/date made/last edited/numerically... then you can do that in Windows Explorer by right clicking and putting then cursor over sort.

[Da_maniaC]

No, no...

I mean sort as in the scenario i explained above...

I have one folder that contains a hundred subfolders.

But i want all of these subfolders sorted somewhere else (including the data that is inside of them of course).

And by this i mean cutting or copying the subfolders somewhere else... :)

But inside every subfolder i have a txt file that contains the criteria (date) which i want to use for the sorting.

[ɹəuəllıʍ ʇɐb]

I have to repeat Hb_Kai's question - what do you mean by "sorting"?

Sorting in my terms means to arrange a list of items, e.g. 7,5,9,2,4,1,8,3,6 to an ordered sequence like 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9.

Files don't need to be sorted; their sequence is of no importance. However, the way you use the term "sorting" almost sounds like "moving".

Please clarify.

Anyway, if you mean moving to a location according to the contents of the text file, that could easily be written with any batch script.

[Hb_Kai]

Or are you thinking of coming up with a way to "call" the data off the files on to a simple GUI? In which case, I don't know.

[Da_maniaC]

I really don't see how my usage of the word 'sorting' is confusing. :)

I mean sorting in a way that i have one big folder with junk which i want to sort out into another folder.

Surely that means moving or copying... but the whole essence of sorting something out means you have to start from scratch anyways. :)

The term 'sorting' you guys seem to refer to, sounds more like 'viewing' to me, since there is nothing sorted out in the folder but its just displayed in a preferred manner. (And not to be a smartass at all, but i am well known with windows its capabilities when it comes to this... :P).

I'm not a great programmer... so i really wouldn't know how to write a batch file for something like this.... hence i wondered if there was some piece of software that could do it. :)

[Hb_Kai]

OK, I still don't get it.

You want to "sort" the files so you can "view" them easier? You'd be best off doing that manually like dragging and dropping or something like that.

[Da_maniaC]

Ok, i'll give it another try. :D

Right now i have one folder with approximatly 2500 subfolders.

\...\*.*

All of these subfolders contain data as well as a txt or log file containing a timestamp.

What i want to do is move all the subfolders into a new folder with a decent file stucture such as:

\...\2007\

\...\2008\

\2007\January

\2007\February

\2007\March

\2007\April

\2008\January

\2008\February

\2008\March

\2008\April

This any better? :)

With the limited amount of time off i have at the moment it would take me something like 2 weeks to sort out manually and a tool that does this would always come in handy, so i was hoping if there was one.

[Hb_Kai]

Oh, sorry. I understand you now. :)

So you want to "sort" them in chronological order - year, month, date - year, month, date?

[Da_maniaC]

Well..basically.

They're all in one big folder right now but i want them to be sorted per month in a seperate folder.

[Hb_Kai]

To auto-store themselves?

A batch file could do that I think, but I don't do Batch Programming of any sort, so I'm not sure how to do it.

Are these files auto-saving themselves or are you doing it manually, also what type of data is in the text files apart from the dates of the corresponding months? Just so I understand a bit more, I might be able to help a bit more.

[Hb_Kai]

Actually, following this VB. NET tutorial I'm doing it says

Later, we'll be opening text files and reading the data from them. If we used a For loop to get every line of text, we'd have to know before hand how many lines the text file held. A For Loop would not be very efficient in this case.

So, yes, there would be a program that can do this, but I don't know of any.

You could either start the tutorial yourself beginning with basics of VB. NET and carry on right up to the point you need. (I'm up to the bit I'm at now and started last night. :))

OR: You could wait until there is someone that knows how to do this or a program that can do this, or wait until I get up to that point and can do it for you...

EDIT:- Here's the VB.NET tutorial site if you wanted to do it that way by the way.

http://www.homeandlearn.co.uk/NET/

[Da_maniaC]

In the textfiles there is a lot of plain text and information.

And in some of them there are even several dates (so the program should be able to compare all the dates in the text file and always use the earliest one).

Just to clarify: there are street dates as well as release dates in the text files.

A friend of mine is also a programmer, so i shall try and contact him this week to see if he can cook something up. :)

But, thanks for the information!

Í have some Basic/Pascal programming knowledge but its gonna take quite some time to master enough of it to build an entire program myself.

[Hb_Kai]

Use loops, select case statements and IF... etc statements, then it wouldn't take that long, just need to clarify what text you're expecting before the next.

E.g 07:30AM 11/11/2011

08:00AM 11/11/2011

21:00PM 12/11/20011 etc....

[ɹəuəllıʍ ʇɐb]

These are exactly the kind of "problems" that can easily solved with a script, not a program. Scripting can be executed immediately, whereas a program must be built each time a modification is made. During development and testing, this will of course take very much longer.

Also, a script doesn't need a visible GUI; it just runs and does what it needs to do.

Tip of the day: back up your source data file before you start playing with the script (or program, if you want to do it the complicated way).

P.S. scripting languages for Windows are various, e.g. VBScript, JScript, JavaScipt, Windows Script, etc.

[Hb_Kai]

How do you do it in a batch script? I don't do batch scripts. :)

[ɹəuəllıʍ ʇɐb]

You type it in a text editor, then run it - that simple

(It will need the correct file extension for the Windows Scripting Host to recognize it.)

P.S. a good place to start with scripting is http://www.microsoft.com/technet/scriptcenter/default.mspx

[Hb_Kai]

I know how to save files as batch/MSDOS files, I'm just not sure what the script would be.

[Da_maniaC]

I just talked to that friend of mine this afternoon who is a programmer for work (and i've seen him... he's good at it, lol).

He told me a program like this, even with GUI would cost him about 15 mins to make....

(Apart from some additions such as a read out to which date it found for which folder and what to do with it, so you can determine what happens before the program actually acts).

He told me he was gonna look into it tonight with me over MSN, so i'll see how things go. :)

[ɹəuəllıʍ ʇɐb]

Yes, it should be pretty easy to do.

Just - to repeat myself - make a backup of the original folder / files; you never know what goes wrong with an untested program or script.