File-date-organizer NPM

File Date Organizer for NodeJS

The following document applies to the command-line usage of file-date-organizer. For usage directly in a Node application, please see the alternate README located here.

Purpose

Locate files by date and move them into a date-based folder structure (ie .../YYYY/MM/dd/hh, etc.). Dates are extracted from the file name (ie Screen Shot 2020-05-28 at 10.16.59 AM.png) or the file properties (created date, modified date, etc.).

More info on why I created this is on my blog: https://fredlackey.com

Installation

npm i -g file-date-organizer

Usage

Exatract then date from the name of the file ...

file-date-organizer \
  --source "/Users/flackey/Documents/Screenshots" \
  --target "/Volumes/MPHD01/Screenshots" \
  --use-name \
  --move \
  --recursive \
  --overwrite

... or, use a file property, such as the creation date ...

file-date-organizer \
  --source "/Users/flackey/Documents/Screenshots" \
  --target "/Volumes/MPHD01/Screenshots" \
  --use-created \
  --move \
  --recursive \
  --overwrite

When I process images from my camera, I use both the --use-name switch as well as --use-created. This ensures files without a date in the name still get moved properly.

file-date-organizer \
  --source '/Users/flackey/pCloud Drive/Automatic Upload/' \
  --target /Volumes/MPHD01/Multimedia/Photos/ \
  --move \
  --use-name \
  --use-created \
  --recursive \
  --overwrite \
  --console

The addition of the --console switch adds an output which is helpful for long-running operations...

Console Output

Important:
Combining --use-name and any other --use* option will cuase --use-name to be leveraged first. If a valid name can be found within the name then the properties of the file will be ignored.

Parameters

Name	Description	Type	Default
`source`	Source Directory	`string (path)`
`target`	Desination Directory	`string (path)`
`recursive`	Locate files recursively	`boolean`	`true`
`overwrite`	Overwrite existing target files	`boolean`	`false`
`ignore`	Ignore existing target files	`boolean`	`false`
`copy`	Copy the files	`boolean`	`false`
`move`	Move the files	`boolean`	`false`
`use-name`	Extract date from file name	`boolean`	`false`
`use-created`	Use created date for target folder name	`boolean`	`false`
`use-modified`	Use modified date for target folder name	`boolean`	`false`
`add-type`	Target folder name includes file type	`boolean`	`false`
`add-year`	Target folder name includes file year	`boolean`	`true`
`add-month`	Target folder name includes file month	`boolean`	`true`
`add-day`	Target folder name includes file day	`boolean`	`true`
`add-hour`	Target folder name includes file hour	`boolean`	`false`
`add-minute`	Target folder name includes file minute	`boolean`	`false`
`add-second`	Target folder name includes file second	`boolean`	`false`
`console`	Log activity to console	`boolean`	`false`
`limit`	Number of files to process	`number`
`allow-future`	Allow file names with date in future	`boolean`	`false`