Finding Files (find)

Command Equivalents

Description

PowerShell does not have a separate find command. Instead, this functionality is built directly into Get-ChildItem (the same command aliased to ls and gci) through the use of specific parameters. This provides a more integrated and consistent way to both list and find files.

The core idea is to use Get-ChildItem and tell it to look recursively and filter the results based on your criteria.

Key Parameters for Finding Files

• -Recurse: This is the most important parameter for finding files. It tells Get-ChildItem to search not only in the current directory but in all of its subdirectories as well, traversing the entire directory tree from the starting point.

• -Filter: This is the most efficient parameter for finding files that match a simple wildcard pattern. The filtering is done by the file system provider, which is generally faster than retrieving all files and then filtering them in PowerShell.

• -Include / -Exclude: These parameters provide more flexibility than -Filter and can accept multiple patterns in an array. They are used to specify which items should be explicitly included or excluded from the results. Note: When using -Include, you must also use -Recurse for it to be effective in subdirectories.

• -File / -Directory: These switches limit the search results to only files or only directories, respectively.

Common Usage

Finding Files by Extension

This is the most common use case: finding all files with a specific extension in a directory tree.

# Find all PowerShell script files on the C: drive
Get-ChildItem -Path "C:\" -Recurse -Filter "*.ps1"

Finding Files by a Specific Name

The filter can also be a specific file name.

# Search the entire 'Users' folder for a specific configuration file
Get-ChildItem -Path "C:\Users" -Recurse -Filter "user.config"

Finding Only Directories

You can search for directories with a specific name by combining -Directory and -Filter.

# Find all directories named 'logs' under the Program Files folder
Get-ChildItem -Path "C:\Program Files" -Recurse -Directory -Filter "logs"

Finding Multiple Types of Files

For more complex patterns, -Include is useful. Remember to use -Recurse with it.

# Find all Word and Excel documents in the My Documents folder tree
Get-ChildItem -Path ".\Documents" -Recurse -Include "*.docx", "*.xlsx"