Check if a file exists or not in Windows PowerShell?

I have this script which compares files in two areas of the disk and copies the latest file over the one with the older modified date.

$filestowatch=get-content C:\H\files-to-watch.txt

$adminFiles=dir C:\H\admin\admin -recurse | ? { $fn=$_.FullName; ($filestowatch | % {$fn.contains($_)}) -contains $True}

$userFiles=dir C:\H\user\user -recurse | ? { $fn=$_.FullName; ($filestowatch | % {$fn.contains($_)}) -contains $True}

foreach($userfile in $userFiles)
{

$exactadminfile= $adminfiles | ? {$_.Name -eq $userfile.Name} |Select -First 1
$filetext1=[System.IO.File]::ReadAllText($exactadminfile.FullName)
$filetext2=[System.IO.File]::ReadAllText($userfile.FullName)
$equal = $filetext1 -ceq $filetext2 # case sensitive comparison

if ($equal) {
Write-Host "Checking == : " $userfile.FullName
continue;
}

if($exactadminfile.LastWriteTime -gt $userfile.LastWriteTime)
{
Write-Host "Checking != : " $userfile.FullName " >> user"
Copy-Item -Path $exactadminfile.FullName -Destination $userfile.FullName -Force
}
else
{
Write-Host "Checking != : " $userfile.FullName " >> admin"
Copy-Item -Path $userfile.FullName -Destination $exactadminfile.FullName -Force
}
}

Here is the format of files-to-watch.txt

content\less\_light.less
content\less\_mixins.less
content\less\_variables.less
content\font-awesome\variables.less
content\font-awesome\mixins.less
content\font-awesome\path.less
content\font-awesome\core.less

I would like to modify this so that it avoids doing this if the file does not exist in both areas and prints a warning message. Can someone tell me how I can check if a file exists using PowerShell?

The standard way to see if a file exists is with the `Test-Path` cmdlet.

Test-Path -path $filename

You can use the `Test-Path` cmd-let. So something like...

if(!(Test-Path [oldLocation]) -and !(Test-Path [newLocation]))
{
Write-Host "$file doesn't exist in both locations."
}

Just to offer [the alternative](

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) to the [`Test-Path` cmdlet](

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) (since nobody mentioned it):

[System.IO.File]::Exists($path)

Does (almost) the same thing as

Test-Path $path -PathType Leaf

except no support for wildcard characters

Test-Path may give odd answer. E.g. "Test-Path c:\temp\ -PathType leaf" gives false, but "Test-Path c:\temp\* -PathType leaf" gives true. Sad :(

Use [Test-Path](

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):

if (!(Test-Path $exactadminfile) -and !(Test-Path $userfile)) {
Write-Warning "$userFile absent from both locations"
}

Placing the above code in your `ForEach` loop should do what you want

cls

$exactadminfile = "C:\temp\files\admin" #First folder to check the file

$userfile = "C:\temp\files\user" #Second folder to check the file

$filenames=Get-Content "C:\temp\files\files-to-watch.txt" #Reading the names of the files to test the existance in one of the above locations

foreach ($filename in $filenames) {
if (!(Test-Path $exactadminfile\$filename) -and !(Test-Path $userfile\$filename)) { #if the file is not there in either of the folder
Write-Warning "$filename absent from both locations"
} else {
Write-Host " $filename File is there in one or both Locations" #if file exists there at both locations or at least in one location
}
}

You want to use `Test-Path`:

Test-Path <path to file> -PathType Leaf