Recursively renaming files with Powershell

powershell rename
Matthew picture Matthew · Feb 6, 2014 · Viewed 36.5k times · Source

I currently have a line to batch rename files in a folder that I am currently in.

dir | foreach { move-item -literal $_ $_.name.replace(".mkv.mp4",".mp4") }

This code works perfectly for whatever directory I'm currently in, but what I want is to run a script from a parent folder which contains 11 child-folders. I can accomplish my task by navigating to each folder individually, but I'd rather run the script once and be done with it.

I tried the following:

get-childitem -recurse | foreach { move-item -literal $_ $_.name.replace(".mkv.mp4",".mp4") }

Can anyone please point me in the right direction here? I'm not very familiar with Powershell at all, but it suited my needs in this instance.

Answer

Cole9350 picture Cole9350 · Feb 6, 2014

You were close:

Get-ChildItem -File -Recurse | % { Rename-Item -Path $_.PSPath -NewName $_.Name.replace(".mkv.mp4",".mp4")}

Related questions

Rename files to lowercase in Powershell

I am trying to rename a bunch of files recursively using Powershell 2.0. The directory structure looks like this: Leaflets + HTML - File1 - File2 ... + HTMLICONS + IMAGES - Image1 - Image2 - File1 - File2 ... + RTF - File1 - File2 ... + SGML …

Read More
Rename-item thinks variable is a path

I'm trying to rename a file but powershell thinks my variable is a string and fails. Here is the script: $date=(get-date -Format d) $time=(get-date -Format t) $source = "D:\_qapi.log" $newfilename = "$date"+"_"+"$time"+"_qapi[SERVERNAME].log" Rename-Item $source …

Read More
Determine installed PowerShell version

How can I determine what version of PowerShell is installed on a computer, and indeed if it is installed at all?

Read More