File manipulation exercise.

So I wanted to research the scope of creating this program (in Dos if possible)that can keep track of a students files throughout the scope of their enrollment.

So there's a program that runs every semester that creates directories for every student (depending on whether they're enrolled or not). I make a backup of the previous semester's data at the end of each semester, and I want the program that i'm going to create to compare the backed up directory to the newly created directory, and copy the files back to their respective directories.

Also i wanted to add a time to live, i.e. in five years clean up data that was created five years in the past and unchanged recently.When the first script is run, I want the program to create a file (like a touch file in linux) that it can use as a reference for the folders create date, and the last time It was updated (so I could scrap the entire directory if it was idle for a year or so).

At the moment security isn't an issue, not to say it's really lax, but this is an recreational exercise so functionality first, security second. I just want some ideas, both in windows code and unix code. thanks AO

Perl can easily handle that, both on windows and *nix.

Thats what I was gonna say :-p

I highly recommend python. Just as useful for shell stuff as perl, with less or a learning curve and less chance of driving the next person to maintain the script postal. (You may still work there when they snap.)

I would create a c# windows console program. Many of the directory traversing and creation classes have already been built.

But to be honest, for createDates (getDate()) and other such information, a database is probably your best bet.

C# (or VB).net console app would do it nicely, and quickly.


For unix I would use c++, or maybe mono.

-xmad