The Old Joel on Software Forum: Part 4 (of 5) - Archiving folders into ZIP files

Archiving folders into ZIP files

Every months I week I upload & download thousands
of EDI Files

All of these files are archived in folders

What I'm looking for is a program which can do the following :

Zip a list of files contained in a folder for a given period
(start date, end date)

Ideally which can filters on File prefixes (file starting with POL* or SEL*)

I'm looking for a solution under Windows ...

Please do not tell me to write my own script or program,
I do not have the time for that right now ;-)

Can anyone recommend me Shareware, Freeware which can does the job ?

Question regarding Windows file system :
Can the file creation date can be retrieve or is it only the last modification date

Gollum
Thursday, February 26, 2004

Couldn't resist: write an Ant script ....

Stephan
Thursday, February 26, 2004

No, no, this is a perfect job for Z80 assembly.

Samo
Thursday, February 26, 2004

Um ... PKZIP maybe ?

sgf
Thursday, February 26, 2004

If your needs are simple, zip can do it. Seriously, one liner:

zip -t 20040101 -tt 20040131 pol-2004-01.zip pol*

This uses zip 2.3 from http://www.info-zip.org/pub/infozip/. You can browse the zip instructions to see if it would meet your needs: http://tinyurl.com/3fdbz

It uses the modification date, not the creation date. If you need finer control, you have to write a VBScript or hold out for your requested freeware/shareware.

If you do choose to go the script route (from memory so may not be totally correct):

Today = Date()
ThisMonthStart = CDate(Month(Today) & "/1/" & Year(Today))
LastMonthStart = DateAdd("m", -1, ThisMonthStart)
LastMonthEnd = DateAdd("d", -1, ThisMonthStart)
' Use FileSystemObject to build a list of files you want.
' Put the list in a text file. Then:
Set WshShell = CreateObject("WScript.Shell")
WshShell.Exec "cmd /C type list-of-files.txt | zip -@ output.zip"

Basically IF you have a moderate knowledge of VBScript it would not be that difficult.

Nate Silva
Thursday, February 26, 2004

Let's review.

You don't have the skill to write a simple script. (You claim a time constraint, but I have an 8-line Ant buildfile that does what you ask, and it took me less time to write than you took to post your question. So let's be honest. Python and Perl folks could probably do it in half that.) But that's not the real problem. We're all here to help one another. You also aren't willing to PAY for a program to do these things, meaning you are too cheap to pay for somebody else's skill where your's lacks. Let's see how long we all have fun jobs if we help people who don't value programming enough to spend a few dollars for it.

I have a short answer, but it will get my post deleted.

Irita
Thursday, February 26, 2004

How are you filtering by date with Ant?

SomeBody
Thursday, February 26, 2004

I use a program called TaskZip for my company's backups. I works happily in the background, and takes 1 - 2 hours to zip up a 800 Mb backup file. The best thing is that it is easy to get stuff out of the backup file when you need it. It also allows you to save the last 'x' backup files.

I haven't tried to do anything complex, but there are a fair few options.

Have a look at:

http://www.matpie.drw.net/PBSystems/products/taskzip/TZip.html

Aussie Mick
Thursday, February 26, 2004

Somebody,
Take a look at Selectors. They're used as subelements to a FileSet to further reduce the set. The Selector you'll want is Date.

<date datetime="10/08/2003 12:00 AM" when="after"/>
<date datetime="11/05/2003 12:00 AM" when="before"/>

Irita
Thursday, February 26, 2004