powershell-compare-directories

A simple PowerShell script for comparing two directory structures to identify file differences.

Compare-DirectoryStructure.ps1

This script helps identify:

• Missing files between directories
• Files with different sizes or timestamps
• Optional content comparison with MD5 hashes

Requirements

• PowerShell 5.1 or higher
• Works on Windows, macOS (with PowerShell Core), and Linux (with PowerShell Core)
• No additional modules required
• Standard user permissions (admin privileges not required unless comparing protected directories)
• Sufficient memory for large directory comparisons (memory usage scales with the number of files)

The script is designed to be cross-platform compatible with minimal dependencies, making it easy to use in various environments.

Usage

.\Compare-DirectoryStructure.ps1 -folderA "C:\SourceFiles" -folderB "D:\BackupFiles"

# With additional options
.\Compare-DirectoryStructure.ps1 -folderA "C:\SourceFiles" -folderB "D:\BackupFiles" -showProgress -checkContent -outputFile "results.csv"

Parameters

Parameter	Type	Required	Description
folderA	String	Yes	Source directory
folderB	String	Yes	Target directory
outputFile	String	No	Save results as CSV
showProgress	Switch	No	Display progress bar
checkContent	Switch	No	Compare file contents with MD5
includeMissingFromA	Switch	No	Find files in B missing from A

Installation

Direct Download

1. Download Compare-DirectoryStructure.ps1 from this repository
2. Save it to your preferred scripts directory
3. Run it directly using PowerShell

That's it! No complex setup required.

Example:

# Navigate to where you saved the script
cd C:\Path\To\Scripts

# Run the script with parameters
.\Compare-DirectoryStructure.ps1 -folderA "C:\SourceFiles" -folderB "D:\BackupFiles"

Sample Output

Found 3 differences.

File                FolderA_Size FolderB_Size Difference Status
----                ------------ ------------ ---------- ------
config.json         1245         978          Size       Different
data.csv            45678        Missing      Missing    Missing in Folder B
backup.ps1          Missing      2341         Missing    Missing in Folder A

Summary:
- Missing in Folder B: 1
- Missing in Folder A: 1
- Different Files: 1