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Number   :  4104
Date     :  2003-03-22
Author   :  meirman@e...
Subject  :  Re: copying folder(s) and retainning the original date
Size(KB) :  6


At 03:43 PM 3/16/03 -0800, theTop wrote:
>Hello,
>
>Is it possible to copy folder(s) and retainning the
>original date on the destination location with xxcopy?
> Have any of you tried this? I looked through xxcopy
>/help and tried some swithes but unable to get what I
>want. I use win98SE. 
>
>Thanks
>
>ps. Do you know of such a tool that can do this.

A partition copy, like comes with most partition managers, or iiuc
Powerquest's Drive Image and a couple similar products will do this, but
I'm pretty certain only for an entire partition.

Of course there are definitely times when one wants to do this for less
than a partition, a directory** and subdirectories**. And I too would like
to be able to do this. It would make the recent directory entries in my
backup partition look more like the original.

I've been thinking about this for quite a while, and I'm thinking someone
(Kan?), could write a bare knuckles method of doing this. Kan knows
most/all DOS command internals, but there are only a few functions one
would need: the ability to identify a directory** entry and distinguish it
from a file entry; the ability to read the date and time of the entry.
(That's only two, plus any related instructions needed to get there.) Then
one could use that datetime to reset the system clock (there are two
clocks, but I think it's the system clock that matters here) to the
datetime of the source directory, and create the target directory. Then go
on to each of the other directories and do the same thing. Finally, reset
the datetime to the original.

Plainly, nothing else could be running when this ran or any files saved
would have incorrect dates, and that can really mess things up (at least
dates later than now can, maybe earlier.) And it would be ironic if, in
trying to make backup dates accurate, one screwed up the dates of
non-backup files.

Kan has a lot on his plate, and it's not for me to tell him what to do. I
don't even know DOS fully yet and I don't know all the features of 4DOS,
and there may be other utilities already written to identify directory
entries and extract the date time. (4DOS is very useful for writing batch
files and for manipulating strings of text data. These sound useful here.
But it's easy for me to push $DOS, because I've already paid for it (~$65
iirc. I bought it when I worked in dos all the time.)

Is Kan or anyone interested in pursuing this?



**I didn't like the change to the words folder and sub-folder just because
I don't like change, and I don't want to have to learn something new. But
I see there is an English problem too. I assume MS? switched to folder to
make it easier for (low-level?) business types and consumers who are used
to folders but who find "directories" a difficult concept. But to me,
"folder" includes both the directory and all the contents of the folder,
that is, all the files in it. I think theTop is really talking about the
directory, (the list of files with their dates and times, and their
computer addresses, but not the files themselves), since there is no
problem retaining file dates and times. "Directory" is used a lot on this
list, and now I think I see why.


To give people a head start, I would suggest:

Dir [drive:][path] /s > c:directory.txt **
rem Then read the directory one line at a time, looking in the proper
columns for  .
rem If one has 4DOS, the first line should be the TREE command.****
rem Even if one doesn't have 4DOS, maybe one can make the DOS6 TREE
command work.****^
rem Then extract the date and time from the proper columns using the
string and substring commands.
rem Then format date and time commands with the text variables***
extracted in the previous line.
XXCOPY that one directory. rem One doesn't know that subdirectories have
the same date and time.
Continue.

If one wished, only the directories need be created on this pass, and then
a regular XXCOPY run can fill in all the files.

So we don't need any DOS command internals to do this, only 1) a method to
read redirected output or a text file one line at a time, and I'm pretty
sure I've seen that already. 2) perhaps a method to break up what for some
will be an enormously long list of directories and files.

WRT 2) above, it might be better to read the redirected output. Perhaps it
wouldn't be necessary to create a directory.txt file, at all. Even if it
was done, one could check the correct columns for directory entries, and
discard any line that represented only a file. Then he would save only
directory lines.


**** !!!! If one has 4DOS, the first line should read "Tree C: /B/T/H dir:"
. Then every line is a directory entry. 
Dir: is the directory to use as the start of the tree, or it uses one's
"current directory". More than one directory can be specified. A batch
file which calls this can have sufficient parameters to pass at least 10
directories, iirc.
/B eliminates indentation and graphics and puts a fully qualified
directory name on each line.
/T includes the date and time on each line.
/H finds hidden directories.

A simple version of this seems like it would not take much time. Making it
versatile and easy to use might triple the time.

****^ There doesn't seem to be a DOS7 TREE command, and currently my DOS6
TREE command won't work in DOS7/Win98, because it says "Incorrect DOS
Version". But with the SETVER command, this should be able to be overcome.
OK, there doesn't seem to be a SETVER command in DOS7 either. 

Maybe one could boot to DOS7 and then start a DOS6 shell. Well, I can't do
that from a DOS6 box. It says "Incorrect DOS Version". Maybe there is
some way to run a TREE command in DOS7, or a third-party TREE utility we
could use. Aha, XXCOPY has an option to copy only directories. It runs in
DOS7 and it could probably write the kind of file we need. Enough for now.
I'm worn out. 

I apologize for the stream of consciousness style, but I'm too tired to
rewrite it. And leaving in my dead-ends will help if someone knows that I
gave on some method too quickly.


**One can write this so that it knows it is a file, not a directory, but I
can't keep that straight. If one can't, sample 4dos batch files show how
to answer the question that DOS will ask with an "F" with no user
intervention required.
***mostly numbers but they have -'s and :'s. I think 4dos might allow one
to set the date and time in one command, but it's almost as easy without
that.

Meir 

meirman@e... Baltimore, MD, USA



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