Vista - Optimizing PS Script to List directories

Hey,

If I run the command below it will list all directories that have the
word "Data" in the path, if I run it locally it's real quick and can
find all the paths within seconds, but I need to run it on all our
remote file servers and it is dog slow and was wondering if anyone
knew anyway to optimise it?

get-childitem \\server\e$ "Data" -recurse | Where-Object {$_.mode -
match "d" } | Select-Object fullname

I am assuming it is slow because the first path of the command
searches the entire file system to find all folders AND files that
match "Data", then it is piped into the second part where it is then
restricted down to folders and then on the second part when it is then
restricted down to only output the path. It tries to bring across way
too much information across the WAN to have it filtered down on my
machine.

I need to extract about 10 - 15 paths on 102 remote files servers, if
it takes hours to do each server it's not worth doing a script and
I'll just have to find them manually. The path I am looking for is
never going be deep down in the file structure, it should be three
levels down from root, and I don't want files, just the folder path,
like ...

\\server\x$\BusinessUnitX\Folder1\Data
\\server\x$\BusinessUnitY\Folder1\Data

Anyone have any ideas?
Thanks

On Jun 21, 9:23 am, spdr <p...@iinet.net.au> wrote:
> Hey,
>
> If I run the command below it will list all directories that have the
> word "Data" in the path, if I run it locally it's real quick and can
> find all the paths within seconds, but I need to run it on all our
> remote file servers and it is dog slow and was wondering if anyone
> knew anyway to optimise it?
>
> get-childitem \\server\e$ "Data" -recurse | Where-Object {$_.mode -
> match "d" } | Select-Object fullname
>
> I am assuming it is slow because the first path of the command
> searches the entire file system to find all folders AND files that
> match "Data", then it is piped into the second part where it is then
> restricted down to folders and then on the second part when it is then
> restricted down to only output the path. It tries to bring across way
> too much information across the WAN to have it filtered down on my
> machine.
>
> I need to extract about 10 - 15 paths on 102 remote files servers, if
> it takes hours to do each server it's not worth doing a script and
> I'll just have to find them manually. The path I am looking for is
> never going be deep down in the file structure, it should be three
> levels down from root, and I don't want files, just the folder path,
> like ...
>
> \\server\x$\BusinessUnitX\Folder1\Data
> \\server\x$\BusinessUnitY\Folder1\Data
>
> Anyone have any ideas?
> Thanks

One quick idea.

The PSIsContainer NoteProperty will certainly be faster than the -
match operator:

get-childitem \\server\e$ "Data" -recurse | Where-Object
{$_.PSIsContainer} | Select-Object fullname

Other than that, I don't know.

Jeff

You may slightly change Get-File.ps1 at
http://nightroman.spaces.live.com/bl...39FA!131.entry so
that it returns directories and ignores files completely.

Hope this helps.

--
Thanks,
Roman Kuzmin

Here is the prototype. You may get rid of used Get-Drive or use it from
http://nightroman.spaces.live.com/bl...39FA!131.entry

##
## Author : Roman Kuzmin
## Synopsis : Get all directories
##
## Returns System.IO.DirectoryInfo objects or full names.
## -Root: root directory(s); single \\ or // denotes all physical drives.
## -Name: return full names as strings.
##
## *) requires Get-Drive.ps1.
## *) access errors are silently ignored.
## *) hidden and system items are included.
## *) reparse points directories are excluded.
##

param
(
[string[]]$Root = '.',
[switch]$Name
)

function GetDirectories([System.IO.DirectoryInfo]$di)
{
# ignore errors
trap {continue}

# directories
foreach($d in $di.GetDirectories()) {
if (!($d.Attributes -band [System.IO.FileAttributes]::ReparsePoint)) {
if ($Name) {
$d.FullName
} else {
$d
}
GetDirectories $d
}
}
}

if ($Root.Count -eq 1 -and ($Root[0] -eq '\\' -or $Root[0] -eq '//')) {
foreach($d in Get-Drive) {
GetDirectories $d.RootDirectory
}
} else {
foreach($d in $Root) {
GetDirectories $d
}
}


--
Thanks,
Roman Kuzmin

"Roman Kuzmin" <z@z.z> wrote in message
news:e72Mjb%23sHHA.4236@TK2MSFTNGP05.phx.gbl...
> You may slightly change Get-File.ps1 at
> http://nightroman.spaces.live.com/bl...39FA!131.entry so
> that it returns directories and ignores files completely.
>
> Hope this helps.
>
> --
> Thanks,
> Roman Kuzmin
>

"spdr" <pear@iinet.net.au> wrote in message
news:1182392599.525362.127170@e9g2000prf.googlegroups.com...
....
> I need to extract about 10 - 15 paths on 102 remote files servers, if
> it takes hours to do each server it's not worth doing a script and
> I'll just have to find them manually. The path I am looking for is
> never going be deep down in the file structure, it should be three
> levels down from root, and I don't want files, just the folder path,
> like ...
>
> \\server\x$\BusinessUnitX\Folder1\Data
> \\server\x$\BusinessUnitY\Folder1\Data

Roman's answer with GetDirectories() might just be what you need. I also
wanted to highlight an interesting feature of PowerShell which is not very
well known:

PS> dir \\server\x$\BusinessUnit*\Folder*\Data\*

.... will list all items in both BusinessUnitX\Folder1\Data and
BusinessUnitY\Folder1\Data folders, plus BusinessUnitX\Folder2\Data if it
exists, etc.

Might help you target your search more easily.

Jacques

Thanks for all your help guys, I'll have a play and see how I go.