Batch file to delete files older than N days

Question

I am looking for a way to delete all files older than 7 days in a batch file. I\'ve searched around the web, and found some examples with hundreds of lines of code, and oth

Answer 1

Might I add a humble contribution to this already valuable thread. I'm finding that other solutions might get rid of the actual error text but are ignoring the %ERRORLEVEL% which signals a fail in my application. AND I legitimately want %ERRORLEVEL% just as long as it isn't the "No files found" error.

Some Examples:

Debugging and eliminating the error specifically:

forfiles /p "[file path...]\IDOC_ARCHIVE" /s /m *.txt /d -1 /c "cmd /c del @path" 2>&1 |  findstr /V /O /C:"ERROR: No files found with the specified search criteria."2>&1 | findstr ERROR&&ECHO found error||echo found success

Using a oneliner to return ERRORLEVEL success or failure:

forfiles /p "[file path...]\IDOC_ARCHIVE" /s /m *.txt /d -1 /c "cmd /c del @path" 2>&1 |  findstr /V /O /C:"ERROR: No files found with the specified search criteria."2>&1 | findstr ERROR&&EXIT /B 1||EXIT /B 0

Using a oneliner to keep the ERRORLEVEL at zero for success within the context of a batchfile in the midst of other code (ver > nul resets the ERRORLEVEL):

forfiles /p "[file path...]\IDOC_ARCHIVE" /s /m *.txt /d -1 /c "cmd /c del @path" 2>&1 |  findstr /V /O /C:"ERROR: No files found with the specified search criteria."2>&1 | findstr ERROR&&ECHO found error||ver > nul

For a SQL Server Agent CmdExec job step I landed on the following. I don't know if it's a bug, but the CmdExec within the step only recognizes the first line of code:

cmd /e:on /c "forfiles /p "C:\SQLADMIN\MAINTREPORTS\SQL2" /s /m *.txt /d -1 /c "cmd /c del @path" 2>&1 |  findstr /V /O /C:"ERROR: No files found with the specified search criteria."2>&1 | findstr ERROR&&EXIT 1||EXIT 0"&exit %errorlevel%