Creating a batch file to copy user local data to a folder

I dont want to copy the whole users profile all i want to do is scan the c: drive for users data . then take those files and create a folder in the users My documents folder called c_backup and put the files there. the reason for this is i know all users dont copy everything to my documents so i need to scan the c drive for them in case they have saved some files out of their my documents folder.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that exactly what you want is not possible - i.e. You cannot use any script to "scan" for certain types of files, and copy them if they exist. I'm miles from a scripting genius but I can't see how that would be possible.

But from what you've listed, i.e. favorites, .pst, .nk2 etc, surely these are all in the same location on each PC? Certainly favourites are in %userprofile%\Favorites, and usually the relevant .pst files are also located within say %userprofile%\Appdata\Microsoft\Office\Outlook or something like that.

Then your script could simply use those locations, e.g. "copy %userprofile%\Appdata\Microsoft\Office\Outlook\*.pst \\server\<Redirected My Docs location>", or "copy %userprofile%\Favorites\*.* \\server\<Redirected My Docs location>".

I mean that's not what the script would say but that's what it would do. It would no doubt have to be a little more detailed than that, for example to try and stop the files copying if the exact same file already exists at the destination (unmodified) etc.

Or would you disagree with that line of thought?

Pete

Just got the signature to work on......

the other three seem to be working okay.....

@echo off
 
md "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\pst" 2>nul
md "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\nk2" 2>nul
md "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\signature" 2>nul
md "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\favorites" 2>nul
 
echo Copying PST files....
xcopy "%userprofile%\Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook\*.pst" "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\pst\" /y /q /r >nul 2>&1
 
if %errorlevel%==4 (
   echo.
   echo You must close Outlook before backing up it's PST files....
   echo.
   pause
   exit /b 4
)
 
echo Copying NK2 files....
xcopy "%userprofile%\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook\*.nk2" "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\nk2\" /y /q /r >nul
 
echo Copying Favourites....
xcopy "%userprofile%\Favorites\*.*" "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\Favorites\" /y /r /q /s /h 1>nul 2>errors.txt
exit /b
                                              

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Please try this:

Copy and paste the code into Notepad and save as SAVEDATA.BAT (or whatever name you choose) then, fire up a DOS box and enter the following command:

   SAVEDATA

.

@echo off
 
md "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\pst" 2>nul
md "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\nk2" 2>nul
md "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\signatures" 2>nul
md "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\favorites" 2>nul
 
echo Copying PST files....
xcopy "%userprofile%\Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook\*.pst" "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\pst\" /y /q /r >nul 2>&1
if %errorlevel%==4 (
   echo.
   echo You must close Outlook before backing up it's PST files....
   echo.
   pause
   exit /b 4
)
 
echo Copying NK2 files....
xcopy "%userprofile%\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook\*.nk2" "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\nk2\" /y /q /r >nul
 
echo Copying Favourites....
xcopy "%userprofile%\Favorites\*.*" "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\Favorites\" /y /r /q /s /h 1>nul 2>errors.txt
 
echo Copying Outlook's signatures....
xcopy "%userprofile%\Application Data\Microsoft\Signatures\*.*" "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\signatures" /y /q /r >nul
exit /b
                                              

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Ok excellent file works and it captures the data .One thing though how do i modify it so that the c_backup folder gets named as the actual user profile name so that if i move this back up folders to a network share i dont have all the files named c_back up but actually the users name ?? Thanks for all your help i really appreciate it

As it stands, it is up to your backup script on the server to rename the c_backup folder as it copies it to the network share. This information would be gotten from the environment variable %computername%.

It might have been better from the outset to have placed all the saved data to a subfolder off c_backup. This subfolder could be named using %computername%. The folder structure would look something like this:

%userprofile% --- My Documents --- c_backup --- %computername% --- pst
                                                                                                                  |
                                                                                                                  +- nk2
                                                                                                                  |
                                                                                                                  +- signatures
                                                                                                                  |
                                                                                                                  -- favorites


This would expand to something like the following (asuming the username is PAUL and the computername is PC1):


C:\Documents and Settings --- Paul --- My Documents --- c_backup --- PC1 --- pst
                                                                                                                          |
                                                                                                                          +- nk2
                                                                                                                          |
                                                                                                                          +- signatures
                                                                                                                          |
                                                                                                                          -- favorites


Now if you backup the c_backup folder, because the 'c_backup' folder may already exist on your network share, the resultant network share might look somethig like this:

........ c_backup --- PC 1 --- pst
                           |            |
                           |            +- nk2
                           |            |
                           |            +- signatures
                           |            |
                           |            -- favorites
                           |
                           +- PC2 --- pst
                           |            |
                           |            +- nk2
                           |            |
                           |            +- signatures
                           |            |
                           |            -- favorites
                           |
                           +- PC3 --- pst
                           |            |
                           |            +- nk2
                           |            |

                           etc.....


Please let me know if this is okay. It will mean changing the lines:

    md "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\pst" 2>nul

to:

    md "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\%computername%\pst" 2>nul

and:

    xcopy "%userprofile%\Favorites\*.*" "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\Favorites\"

to:

    xcopy "%userprofile%\Favorites\*.*" "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\%computername%\Favorites\"

etc....

See the code below:
.


                                       
                                 

@echo off
 
md "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\%computername%\pst" 2>nul
md "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\%computername%\nk2" 2>nul
md "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\%computername%\signatures" 2>nul
md "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\%computername%\favorites" 2>nul
 
echo Copying PST files....
xcopy "%userprofile%\Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook\*.pst" "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\%computername%\pst\" /y /q /r >nul 2>&1
if %errorlevel%==4 (
   echo.
   echo You must close Outlook before backing up it's PST files....
   echo.
   pause
   exit /b 4
)
 
echo Copying NK2 files....
xcopy "%userprofile%\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook\*.nk2" "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\%computername%\nk2\" /y /q /r >nul
 
echo Copying Favourites....
xcopy "%userprofile%\Favorites\*.*" "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\%computername%\Favorites\" /y /r /q /s /h 1>nul 2>errors.txt
 
echo Copying Outlook's signatures....
xcopy "%userprofile%\Application Data\Microsoft\Signatures\*.*" "%userprofile%\My Documents\c_backup\%computername%\signatures" /y /q /r >nul
exit /b

                                              

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godd thorough explanation and support