Hardware Analysis - Changing file modification dates

Re: Changing file modification dates

Gerritt — 2008-04-21T21:30:15-05:00

touch! Thats what I was thinking about!
Unfortunately its a Unix command......
It looks like some of the freeware encorporates this functionality into the windows environment, but I thought it as already there.....Hmmmm, I must be thinking about DRDOS or OS/2.

Gerritt

Re: Changing file modification dates

McFly — 2008-04-20T18:23:49-05:00

Well now that's not a bad idea. I hadn't thought of extracting the dates that way. Good thinkin'.

grep I love. There's quite a few *nix commands that I like so much I downloaded the GNU tools for Windows.

Re: Changing file modification dates

john albrich — 2008-04-20T18:07:49-05:00

McFly said:

...but none that will let me set the last mod date on a batch of files to that same files creation date ...

Oh, I think I see the problem. You want the program to automatically interrogate the Creation Date, and then set the Mod Date to the same value. You don't just need a program that allows you to simply change the date fields. Is that it?

I'm 90% positive XXCOPY can do that even in a folder with sub-folders environment via a recursive script. I've been able to finagle XXCOPY to do some pretty bizarre things. But then, I'm an old grep/egrep hound

For example, you'd write a batch file that would first extract the filenames and creation dates into a file. You'd then read in that file and reading each line of the file in order, use the creation date column as the input to the script to modify the mod date field of the file ID'd in the filename column.

"XXCOPY in batch files"
http://www.xxcopy.com/xxcopy19.htm

The yahoo group might be able to help too.
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/xxcopy/

I very strongly suggest experimenting on copies in a temporary folder before trying any scripts on the real files. Recursive scripts can go squirrely.

edit-add an overview of how the batch file might operate.

Re: Changing file modification dates

McFly — 2008-04-20T17:47:14-05:00

I've found a bunch of programs that will let me change any of the dates, some that will let me set a batch of files to the current date, but none that will let me set the last mod date on a batch of files to that same files creation date ...

I'll check out of some of those links, thanks. Hopefully I'm not the only one who would want this.

Re: Changing file modification dates

john albrich — 2008-04-20T17:08:14-05:00

_MD_ said:

wouldn't xyxplorer do just that?!

Cool! You're absolutely right!!! I didn't know that.
Yet another reason to really like XYplorer.

Thanks _MD_

It's accessed via the "Properties" tab once you
Edit>>Find Files

Then, you just point to the date field you want to change, enter the replacment data, and click on the "+" symbol. BTW, it's not obvious that the displayed dates are a user-changeable field...there's nothing to distinguish them from the regular text...no box, no highlighting, etc. (which is why I never thought to try that)

Although, I couldn't determine if there's an way to change a bunch of files at a time from within the program.

I also like freeware version of XYplorer's ability to send complete or selected folder and file data to the clipboard, a file, or the printer. No need for more 3rd party programs again. Even freeware version is very impressive and way better than Windows Explorer. http://www.xyplorer.com/free.php

Re: Changing file modification dates

_MD_ — 2008-04-20T16:12:58-05:00

wouldn't xyxplorer do just that?!

Re: Changing file modification dates

john albrich — 2008-04-20T15:58:34-05:00

john albrich said:

What the heck. I gave up on my memory, and just looked for what looked like reasonably functional freeware. However, saying that...the downside is that I have not personally tried any of these, so can't talk to their safety or actual effectiveness. These download sites claim they are ad/spyware free (snapfiles, nonags), but I'd check them again anyway.

Claimed to be freeware:
http://www.snapfiles.com/get/timestamptoucher.html
http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/filedatech.html
http://www.brothersoft.com/change-file-date-time-software-to-c...80599.html

Possible freeware, not sure:
http://www.nonags.com/software.asp?id=3414

Re: Changing file modification dates

john albrich — 2008-04-20T15:41:23-05:00

What the heck. I gave up on my memory, and just looked for what looked like reasonably functional freeware. However, saying that...I have not personally tried any of these, so can't talk to their safety or actual effectiveness. These download sites claim they are ad/spyware free (snapfiles, nonags)

Claimed to be freeware:
http://www.snapfiles.com/get/timestamptoucher.html
http://www.nirsoft.net/utils/filedatech.html
http://www.brothersoft.com/change-file-date-time-software-to-c...80599.html

Possible freeware, not sure:
http://www.nonags.com/software.asp?id=3414

Re: Changing file modification dates

john albrich — 2008-04-20T15:25:20-05:00

McFly said:

XXCOPY seems to come close...
I want something to set the last modified date to the date that it was created.

Wouldn't setting your system clock to the "created date" do that? (of course, be sure to set it back to the right date before doing anything else)

I do however, seem to remember a date setting utility from the vast attic that is my brain...I'll see if I can find it.

To answer "why" someone might want to do this, there are some programs that look at the date even though what you want them to do isn't date related...for one example (if I'm remembering correctly) is WinDiff...a file comparing utility. If the two files to be compared have different dates, it stops the comparison and just tells you they have different dates. So, it won't continue and tell you if the contents are identical or not. This is a very stupid limitation of the program as you might have obtained the files from different sources, and the only difference might be the date because of the way the file was archived/restored/compressed/extracted/etc. You still need to determine if they are identical or not, and if not, you might still need to know exactly what the differences are (which WinDiff shows you when it actually compares the contents)

Re: Changing file modification dates

Tam the Bam — 2008-04-20T09:45:06-05:00

Curiosity's get the better of me. Why you wanting to do this anyways? Just wondering

Re: Changing file modification dates

McFly — 2008-04-20T05:51:49-05:00

XXCOPY seems to come close, I installed it but it's not quite what I'm after ...

Say a file has:
---
Created: Jan 1 2000
Last Mod: Sep 31 2001

I want it to be:
---
Created: Jan 1 2000
Last Mod: Jan 1 2000

I want something to set the last modified date to the date that it was created.

Re: Changing file modification dates

Gerritt — 2008-04-20T02:55:57-05:00

Doesn't the CLI utility ATTRIB allow for this?

Gerritt

Re: Changing file modification dates

john albrich — 2008-04-19T20:56:24-05:00

XXCOPY has the ability to do that rather easily.

It's a nice program with considerable power in batch scripts. New version is Vista compatible.

http://www.xxcopy.com/xxcopy01.htm

The following switches control timestamps
/TTA Touches (modifies) timestamp of Last Access of src.
/TTA0 Preserves timestamp of Last Access of src (default).

/TCA Copies the timestamp of Last Access fm src to dst.
/TCA0 Uses current time for dst Last Access (default).

/TCC Copies the timestamp of Create Time fm src to dst.
/TCC0 Uses current time for dst Create time (default).

/TCW Copies the Last Write time fm src to dst (default).
/TCW0 Uses current time for dst Last Write time.

edit: verified xxcopy has that function and added summary of switches

Re: Changing file modification dates

FordGT90Concept — 2008-04-19T09:30:21-05:00

All I can think of is copying the file using a binary stream. It will set the creation date and last modified date to now.

If it is even possible to do that, it would have to be some application that manipulates the NTFS tables.

Changing file modification dates

McFly — 2008-04-19T04:08:09-05:00

Eh ... so, I have a whole bunch of files, and what I want to do to them is ... set their last modified date to their creation date ... in a batch. Anybody know of a good program for this?