How to add containing folders to collection of files

Hello @Fundeby,

Welcome to TenForums!

Fundeby said:

I have several thousand files that I want put into individual folders of the same name. Does anyone know of a batch method for this?

[1] Are ALL the files currently in the same directory?
[2] Do you want ALL the created folders put into that same directory?

Paul Black said:

Hello @Fundeby,

Welcome to TenForums!


[1] Are ALL the files currently in the same directory?
[2] Do you want ALL the created folders put into that same directory?

I can't wait to see what you come up with Paul. Because I was thinking something similar for myself as I have 10's of thousands of files on 5 or 7 drives. Waiting in anticipation.

Hello @Fundeby,

Create a Files_To_Folders.bat file with the code below in the directory that the files are in.

This batch script creates a folder for each filename in the directory that the batch script resides in and then populates [ moves ] them with the files accordingly. The folders names will be a mirror image of the filenames themselves, excluding the suffix.

WARNING: Setup a test directory directory that includes a selection of filenames FIRST and then run the batch script to ensure that the results are correct and as expected.

Code:

@echo off
title Files To Folders - Written by Paul Black.
echo. & echo  Processing . . . & echo.
for %%i in (*) do (
  if not "%%~ni" == "Files_To_Folders" (
    md "%%~ni" && move "%%~i" "%%~ni"
  )
)
echo. & echo ^>Press ANY key to EXIT . . . & pause >nul

I hope this helps!

Hello @Lance1,

Lance1 said:

I can't wait to see what you come up with Paul. Because I was thinking something similar for myself as I have 10's of thousands of files on 5 or 7 drives. Waiting in anticipation.

Give the code above a try. I setup a folder and copied some files into it [ .txt, .png, .jpg, .odt etc ] and then ran my code and it worked OK!

I hope this helps!

Hello @Lance1,

If you think it will also be useful to have the total number of folders created and the files moved let me know and I will adapt the code accordingly. I can also adapt the code so it doesn't show the long list of 1 file(s) moved..

Paul Black said:

Hello @Lance1,

If you think it will also be useful to have the total number of folders created and the files moved let me know and I will adapt the code accordingly. I can also adapt the code so it doesn't show the long list of 1 file(s) moved..

Yes I think that would be useful Paul thank you.

Here you go @Lance1,

Code:

@echo off
title Files To Folders - Written by Paul Black.
set count=-1
echo. & echo  Processing . . .
for %%j in (*) do set /A Count +=1
for %%i in (*) do (
  if not "%%~ni" == "Files_To_Folders" (
    md "%%~ni" && move "%%~i" "%%~ni" >nul
  )
)
echo. & echo  Created %Count% folders and moved the files successfully!
echo. & echo ^>Press ANY key to EXIT . . . & pause >nul

Please let me know how it works for you [ see Post #4 for warnings and advice ]!

I hope this helps!

Paul Black said:

Here you go @Lance1,

Code:

@echo off
title Files To Folders - Written by Paul Black.
set count=-1
echo. & echo  Processing . . .
for %%j in (*) do set /A Count +=1
for %%i in (*) do (
  if not "%%~ni" == "Files_To_Folders" (
    md "%%~ni" && move "%%~i" "%%~ni" >nul
  )
)
echo. & echo  Created %Count% folders and moved the files successfully!
echo. & echo ^>Press ANY key to EXIT . . . & pause >nul

Please let me know how it works for you [ see Post #4 for warnings and advice ]!

I hope this helps!

Thanks Paul. I just got home, I got a few things to put away. I'm going to format one of my flash drives and take this .BAT for a test drive.

Lance1 said:

Thanks Paul. I just got home, I got a few things to put away. I'm going to format one of my flash drives and take this .BAT for a test drive.

It's nearly midnight here so I will be off to bed shortly!