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I’ve seen a few posts related to this topic, but want to clarify a couple of things about Robocopy first.

I have a public internal share where I’d like to move files from to an archive folder while keeping the same folder structure in the destination.

My question is regarding the MINAGE /MAXAGE and MINLAD / MAXLAD. Is what is a way to remember the difference between them.

my script is robocopy d:\users\ e:\ /e /mov maxlad:1095 because from what I read it looks like maxlad will move files MODIFIED where as maxage moves files by CREATION date.

I would like to move files that move files that have a MODIFIED date 3 years and older. We have a lot of reference files that some people refer back to but don’t change and from what I read, there is an ACCESS flag that is reset when the file is just open. I think that flag is read by minage/maxage but not sure.

6 Spice ups
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I would like to help out but I do not know where your main concern lies with…

  1. Would you need help with the command line, but it looks like you got it…

  2. Would you like to know when to use “last accessed”, “last modified” and/or created date ?

  • created date : date file was created

  • last modified : date file was last saved (we may assume that there were changes made)

  • last access : date file last read, but do note that some software like AV or backup may also be flagged as last access.

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Sorry, man. I’ll clarify.

I keep seeing posts that show how to move files older than… but it doesn’t specify if it is moving the files based on the last modified date or the creation date or the last accessed date.

So to summarize,

MAXAGE / MINAGE uses the MODIFIED DATE in Windows Explorer

MAXAGE EXCLUDES the files based on the time specified

MINAGE will GRAB the files based on the time specified.

MAXLAD / MINLAD uses the ACCESS DATE (which isn’t visible in Windows Explorer)

MAXLAD will EXCLUDE the files based on the time specified

MINLAD will GRAB the files based on the time specified

Does this sound right? This is what I love about Spiceworks Community. Its like having another IT person to bounce thoughts and ideas off of to make sure I’m on the right track. I’m in a one person deep shop and handle most things on my own, but rely on thoughts of the community for help, so thanks for stepping in.

Thanks Limey. I saw your post after. If you can add any thoughts, that’d be great.

@martinpeverley

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I hope this helps (file server created in 2010…today 2017 Aug 30)…I only want to keep 10 days of files on my server.

  1. robocopy source destination*.* /mov /minage:10

    • move all files created from 2010 to 2017 Aug 20 to another location

  2. robocopy source destination*.* /mov /minlad:10

    • move all files edited from 2010 to 2017 Aug 20 to another location
    • if the file was created in 2016 Dec 25, but someone made changes and saved it on 2017 Aug 25, the file will not be moved.
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You want to use a MIN option, probably MINLAD.

The last access date should be updated when a file is modified. Last Modified Date will be updated then too.

But you can also tune NTFS to turn off updating some of those settings to improve performance on a busy file system / fileshare. So you cannot completely depend on the settings being accurate.

Just move the file and tell your users what is happening. So they know to contact you to move back any reference file that got moved. As you are preserving the file structure if should be easy enough to find the missing files.

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Hmm.

First, thanks for the thanks! It all sounds OK as you’ve laid it out, though.

Second, I wouldn’t automatically move files older than X off to an archive location. I’m not saying it’s wrong, just not what I’d do here What happens when you have to go look for a file and don’t find it? “Oh, sorry, that’s in the Archive”. You run the risk of this, having the files in a folder split between two locations based off some arbitrary attribute like date.

We DO have an archive, but it’s all manual movement. The one dept that uses it the most, the supervisor controls what of theirs moves, and when. He moves projects that are complete and reference, and moves the complete folder structure. If you’re looking for “Project X” then it’s in the Archive.

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Thanks Limey. I tried the manual move, but people just don’t do it so I do it for them >:-))

I have a single drive that the files are moved and the folder structure stays the same AND it’s read only. If the go to a folder on the live share and can’t find it, they know where it is in archive and can move it back over if they need it. If they don’t touch it for another 3 years, then it goes back over to the read-only archive.

This could be a separate post, but one user asked if I could generate an email that sends the log of files moved to all users or a DL Group when it’s done. I thought that was brilliant and saw some cool ways to do it in powershell using a generic google account.

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There are many uses of the minage and minlad as I have used it previously to sort out my file server(s).

Users always dump files in the file servers then forget about most of them, actively using less than 2% over 5 years (I did a presentation of my 500 users).

I did the painful method of running robocopy annually (1st Jan to 31st Dec) from 2010 to 2017 as to sort files annually…from \FS\Dept%deptname% to \FS\YYYY%deptname%.

For read-only and media files (pic, mov)…they will be moved based on creation dates (or year).

For other files, they will be sorted based on last modified dates.

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That’s pretty cool. Are you pulling the %department% name from Active Directory and writing that to the metadata of the file in order to perform better indexed searches? If so, that’s some pretty innovative stuff.

I’m going to put the script in a scheduled task on the server so the thing will run from now till eternity, long after Wall-E leaves the planet…

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I use Blat to do this, and a 1&1 email account. The last line in a couple of my Robocopy batch files is something like this:

“c:\Program Files\blat322\full\blat.exe” -attach “%logpath%%filename%” -server smtp.1and1.com -u user@domain.com -pw password -f user@domain.com -t to-user@domain.com -subject “Log file of moved items” -body “Log file of moved items is attached.”

This does assume that you’re setting variables for logpath and filename in your batch file, but if you’ve read some of my Robocopy posts then you’ve likely seen that. If not, see template attached.

::{description}Copy all files from sourcepath to destinationpath using Robocopy
::Last updated on 20170831 by Martin Peverley
::Original file by Adam Rush, http://www.virtuallyimpossible.co.uk
::
::Switches:
::(E)mpty folders included in copy
::(R)etry each copy up to 0 times
::(W)ait 0 seconds between attempts
::(LOG) creates log file
::(NP) do not include progress txt in logfile; this keeps filesize down
::(MIR)rors a directory tree
::(V)erbose logging
::COPYALL Copy all file info
::ETA show Estimated Time of Arrival of copied files

::Source path
::set sourcepath=E:\Backups

::Destination path
::set destinationpath=F:\Backups

::Log path
set logpath=Z:\Logs\Robocopy\

::Include format yyyy-mm-dd#hh-mm-ss.ms in log filename
set filename={jobname}_%date:~-4,4%-%date:~-7,2%-%date:~-10,2%#%time::=-%.txt

::Run command
::robocopy "%sourcepath%" "%destinationpath%" /V /ETA /COPYALL /R:0 /W:0 /LOG:"%logpath%%filename%" /NP /MIR

::Additional run statements for reference or to copy multiple locations
::robocopy "A:\Veeam\Daily Backup Job" "X:\Veeam\Daily Backup Job" /MAXAGE:7 /E /V /ETA /COPYALL /R:0 /W:0 /NP /LOG:c:\"%logpath%%filename%" /TEE

::robocopy "A:\Veeam\File" "X:\Veeam\File" /MAXAGE:7 /E /V /ETA /COPYALL /R:0 /W:0 /LOG+:c:\"%logpath%%filename%" /TEE

::robocopy "B:\IT" "X:\IT" /MIR /V /ETA /COPYALL /R:0 /W:0 /NP /LOG+:c:\"%logpath%%filename%" /TEE

::robocopy "B:\email archives" "X:\email archives" /MIR /V /ETA /COPYALL /R:0 /W:0 /NP /LOG+:c:\”%logpath%%filename%” /TEE

"c:\Program Files\blat322\full\blat.exe" -attach "%logpath%%filename%" -server smtp.1and1.com -u user@domain.com -pw password -f from-user@domain.com -t to-user@domain.com -subject "Subject" -body "Text for body of email"