Use PowerShell to copy files from workstation to server, preserving the directory structure

Question

I'm attempting to copy selected contents of a folder on my workstation to a network share.

Workstation's folder:

\ProjectX
  DocumentA.sql
  DocumentA.ad
  \Build
    DocumentA.csv

I'd like to copy the contents of ProjectX to \\server\shared\projects\ProjectX (the ProjectX folder has already been created).

The desired result:

\ProjectX
  DocumentA.sql
  \Build
    DocumentA.csv

I've tried:

 $destination = '\\server\shared\projects\ProjectX'

 Get-ChildItem '.\*' -Include '*.csv', '*.sql' -Recurse | Foreach { 
    Copy-Item -Path $_ -Destination $destination -Recurse
 }

Unfortunately, this results in:

\ProjectX
  DocumentA.sql
  DocumentA.csv

What am I missing?

I'm not interested in an answer involving robocopy.

Answer 1

It's a pain because Copy-Item is too stupid to do the job right. That means you have to program the logic yourself.

Usually I end up with something like this:

$Source = (Get-Location).Path;
$Destination = '\\server\shared\projects\ProjectX';

Get-ChildItem -Path $Source -Include '*.csv','*.sql' -Recurse | ForEach-Object {
    # Get the destination file's full name
    $FileDestination = $_.FullName.Replace($Source,$Destination);

    # Get the destination file's parent folder
    $FileDestinationFolder = Split-Path $FileDestination -Parent;

    #Create the  destination file's parent folder if it doesn't exist
    if (!(Test-Path -Path $FileDestinationFolder)) {
        New-Item -ItemType Directory -Path $FileDestinationFolder | Out-Null;        
    }

    # Copy the file
    Copy-Item -Path $_.FullName -Destination $FileDestination;
}

Edit: I think this will fail when you try to create a subdirectory when the parent directly doesn't exist. I'll leave that as an exercise for the reader.