Checking file names in a directory with entries in an excel spreadsheet; What am I doing wrong? - excel

Question

I'm attempting to write a PowerShell script (my first ever, so be gentle) to go through all the file names in a directory and check if they exist in an excel spreadsheet that I have. If a file name does exist in both, I want to move/copy that file to a new directory.
Right now it runs with no errors, but nothing actually happens.
So far I have:
#open excel sheet
$objexcel=new-object -com excel.application
$workbook=$objexcel.workbooks.open("<spreadsheet location>")
#use Sheet2
$worksheet = $workbook.sheets.Item(2)
#outer loop: loop through each file in directory
foreach ($_file in (get-childitem -path "<directory to search>"))
{
$filename = [system.IO.path]::GetFileNameWithoutExtension($_)
#inner loop: check with every entry in excel sheet (if is equal)
$intRowCount = ($worksheet.UsedRange.Rows).count
for ($intRow = 2 ; $intRow -le $intRowCount ; $intRow++)
{
$excelname = $worksheet.cells.item($intRow,1).value2
if ($excelname -eq $filename)
{ #move to separate folder
Copy-Item -path $_file -Destination "<directory for files to be copied to>"
}
#else do nothing
}
}
#close excel sheet
$workbook.close()
$objexcel.quit()

Answer 1

You're trying to define $filename based on the current object ($_), but that variable isn't populated in a foreach loop:
$filename = [system.IO.path]::GetFileNameWithoutExtension($_)
Because of that $filename is always $null and therefore never equal to $excelname.
Replace the foreach loop with a ForEach-Object loop if you want to use $_. I'd also recommend to read the Excel cell values into an array outside that loop. That improves performance and allows you to use the array it in a -contains filter, which would remove the need for having a loop in the first place.
$intRowCount = ($worksheet.UsedRange.Rows).count
$excelnames = for ($intRow = 2; $intRow -le $intRowCount; $intRow++) {
$worksheet.cells.item($intRow,1).value2
}
Get-ChildItem -Path "<directory to search>" |
Where-Object { $excelnames -contains $_.BaseName } |
Copy-Item -Destination "<directory for files to be copied to>"
On a more general note: you shouldn't use variable names starting with an underscore. They're too easily confused with properties of the current object variable ($_name vs. $_.name).