Remove-PnPFileVersion

[IsaacM72]

Good morning,

I'm still new on dealing with SP storage management and busy testing on a single file the following script to remove excessive file versions. I have a particular library where files are around 200-400MB and each consumes large chunks of storage due to file versions.

Issue is similar to this thread (#3130) but the script I am using is as follows :

#Define Parameters
$SiteURL = "XXX"
$FileRelativePath = "XXX.pptx"
$VersionsToKeep = 20

#Connect to PnP Online
Connect-PnPOnline -Url "XXX" -Interactive -ClientId

#Get File Versions
$File = Get-PnPFile -Url $FileRelativePath
$Versions = Get-PnPProperty -ClientObject $File -Property versions

#Notification of file collected
Write-host -f Yellow "Scanning File:"$File.Name
$VersionsCount = $Versions.Count
write-host -f Cyan "`t Total Number of Versions of the File:" $VersionsCount

$VersionsToDelete = $VersionsCount - $VersionsToKeep
If($VersionsToDelete -gt 0)
{
write-host -f Cyan "t Total Number of Versions to be deleted:" $VersionsToDelete #Delete versions For($i=0; $i -lt $VersionsToDelete; $i++) { If($Versions[$i].IsCurrentVersion) { $VersionsToDelete++ Continue } write-host -f Cyan "t Deleting Version:" $Versions[$i].VersionLabel
Remove-PnPFileVersion -Url $FileRelativePath -Identity $Versions[$i].ID -Force
}
Write-Host -f Green "`t Version History is cleaned for the File:"$File.Name
]

I created the app in Entra with API Permissions set to AllSites.FullControl.
The script runs fine up to this section where I get an Access Denied error.

"Remove-PnPFileVersion -Url $FileRelativePath -Identity $Versions[$i].ID -Force"

I have given the account that I use to sign in SP Admin role as well as added to the Members and Owners of the particular SP site as well, although I would have assumed it should not be required.

The intention is to test this on a single file before I try this on a complete library or site.
@kasperbolarsen I've read your response to the other thread with the same issue but I'm not sure how to implement your version of the script in your link as I don't know what the $thumbprint and CertificatePath refers to.

[IsaacM72]

Some additional info. I had a look at API access in SP Admin site. there is a Graph Connector Service with Sites.FullControl.All permissions. I am assuming that this is the PnP app access.

[AndersRask]

Thumbprints and certificate path refers only to login using so called application registrations. You can ignore those if you want to log in using your user account. The advantage of logging in using application registration (app registration) is that you have a larger quota of requests before getting throttled. Also if you want to run scripts non-interactively (eg in an Azure Function or in a runbook) app registrations or managed identity is the better option.
Throttling protection is build into pnp.powershell in a retry handler, but you should still be wary of not hitting your tenant with too many requests. So before cutting versions in large scale on your SharePoint sites, test with single sites and try to spread out the load by pausing the script for example between sites.
Read more on throttling here https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/dev/general-development/how-to-avoid-getting-throttled-or-blocked-in-sharepoint-online

[IsaacM72]

Thank you Anders,
I did do the App registration following instructions somewhere else as it seemed a little more secure. I don't manage a massive tenant but I'd prefer not to get throttled.
At the moment I'm trying to get past the Access denied message I get as the script above runs on only one file as a test. Once I'm comfortable, and solved the Access Denied issue, I'll try it on one of the sites of perhaps only a directory on a site.

[IsaacM72]

@kasperbolarsen I have attempted your sample script, but I only get an output stating "site storage 975.41GB"
The only modification I made to your script was to remove Line 6 and 16 from -Certificatepath as I don't have a certificate.
I created this location but no output was generated here: $outputPath = "C:\temp\versiontrimmer"