Command - rename all pdf files in directory (and subdirectories) with sufix _YYYYMMDD-HHMM

Question

Command - rename all pdf files in directory (and subdirectories) with sufix _YYYYMMDD-HHMM

Salka, Milan 111

Hello,

exist any possibility how to create cmd/powershell command to find (in directory and in all subdirectories) all pdf files, read data of create pdf file (YYYYMMDDHHMM) and rename all PDF file with new sufix "_YYYYMMDD-HHMM" e.g. Name_YYYYMMDD-HHMM.pdf (only for when sufix isn´t yet exist).

Thank you.

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3 answers

Your answer

Answer 1

Tsingtao Kai 80

Hi

Firstly,review.

Get-ChildItem -Path "C:\your catlog" -Recurse -Filter *.pdf |

Rename-Item -NewName { 

    $_.Name -replace '(?i)\.pdf$', ("_" + $_.LastWriteTime.ToString('yyyyMMdd-HHmm') + '.pdf') 

} -WhatIf

Secondly,rename

Get-ChildItem -Path "C:\your catlog" -Recurse -Filter *.pdf |

Rename-Item -NewName { 

    $_.Name -replace '(?i)\.pdf$', ("_" + $_.LastWriteTime.ToString('yyyyMMdd-HHmm') + '.pdf') 

}

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Answer 2

You can achieve this with PowerShell by combining Get-ChildItem to enumerate PDFs, Get-ItemProperty to read the CreationTime, and Rename-Item to append the suffix only when it doesn’t already exist. A reliable approach is:

Get-ChildItem -Path "C:\Your\Directory" -Recurse -Filter *.pdf | ForEach-Object {
    $creation = $_.CreationTime.ToString("yyyyMMdd-HHmm")
    $baseName = [System.IO.Path]::GetFileNameWithoutExtension($_.Name)
    if ($baseName -notmatch "\d{8}-\d{4}$") {
        $newName = "$baseName" + "_" + $creation + ".pdf"
        Rename-Item -Path $_.FullName -NewName $newName
    }
}

This script traverses all subdirectories, formats the timestamp as YYYYMMDD-HHMM, and renames only if the suffix isn’t already present. Make sure you run it with sufficient permissions in the target directory, and test first on a small set of files to confirm the naming convention before applying it broadly.

Answer 3

Use PowerShell with Rename-Item and a recursive file search, then build the new name from the file’s creation time and append the suffix only if it isn’t already present.

Example script:

Get-ChildItem -Path 'C:\Path\To\Root' -Recurse -Filter *.pdf | ForEach-Object {
    $creation = $_.CreationTime
    $stamp = $creation.ToString('yyyyMMdd-HHmm')

    $baseName = [System.IO.Path]::GetFileNameWithoutExtension($_.Name)
    $ext      = $_.Extension

    # Skip if suffix already present
    if ($baseName -match '_\d{8}-\d{4}$') {
        return
    }

    $newName = "$baseName`_$stamp$ext"

    Rename-Item -Path $_.FullName -NewName $newName
}

Notes:

Get-ChildItem -Recurse -Filter *.pdf finds all PDF files in the directory and subdirectories.
CreationTime is formatted as YYYYMMDD-HHMM.
The regex '_\d{8}-\d{4}$' checks whether a suffix like _20240526-1430 already exists and skips those files.
Rename-Item changes only the name; it does not move or overwrite items.

If running from the target directory, -Path can be '.' instead of a full path.

References:

Rename-Item

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Command - rename all pdf files in directory (and subdirectories) with sufix _YYYYMMDD-HHMM

3 answers

Your answer