How do I remove Blank Space from File Names

Question

I am trying to remove blank spaces from many file names using PowerShell 3.0. Here is the code that I am working with:

$Files = Get-ChildItem -Path "C:\PowershellTests\With_Space"
Copy-Item $Files.FullName -Destination C:\PowershellTests\Without_Space
Set-Location -Path C:\PowershellTests\Without_Space
Get-ChildItem *.txt | Rename-Item -NewName { $_.Name -replace ' ','' }

For example: the With_Space directory has these files:

Cable Report 3413109.pdf
Control List 3.txt
Test Result Phase 2.doc

The Without_Space directory will need the above file name to be:

CableReport3413109.pdf
ControlList3.txt
TestResultPhase 2.doc

Currently, the script shows no error but it only copies the source files to the destination folder, but doesn't remove the spaces in file names.

Answer 1

Your code should work just fine, but since Get-ChildItem *.txt lists only .txt files the last statement should remove the spaces from just the text files, giving you a result like this:

Cable Report 3413109.pdf
ControlList3.txt
Test Result Phase 2.doc

This should remove spaces from the names of all files in the folder:

Get-ChildItem -File | Rename-Item -NewName { $_.Name -replace ' ','' }

Prior to PowerShell v3 use this to restrict processing to just files:

Get-ChildItem | Where-Object { -not $_.PSIsContainer } |
    Rename-Item -NewName { $_.Name -replace ' ','' }

Answer 2

something like this could work

$source = 'C:\temp\new'
$dest = 'C:\temp\new1'
Get-ChildItem $source | % {copy $_.FullName $(join-path $dest ($_.name -replace ' '))}

Answer 3

I think your script should almost work, except $_ isn't going to be defined as anything. By using the for-each cmdlet (%), you assign it and then can use it.

Get-ChildItem *.txt | %{Rename-Item -NewName ( $_.Name -replace ' ','' )}

EDIT: That interpretation was totally wrong. Some people seem to have found it useful, but as soon as you have something being piped, it appears that $_ references the object currently in the pipe. My bad.