The most current file writen on the disk

[tmaxial]

Hi.

In my project I have to sort the files from a directory using the date. I must find the most current created file( the file with the date closer to the current date of computer).

Is there a method to sort the files from a directory using their names?

I tryed to use the GetFirstFile and GetNextFile functions and than compare the date of files or the names of that files.
Is theire another method to do this?

Thanks.

[ryank]

Kind of long, but this works:

#include 
#include "toolbox.h"
#include 
int main()
{
	int result;
	int seconds;
	int minutes;
	int hours;
	int year;
	int day;
	int month;
	char maxName[500];
	char fileName[500];
	char *filePath = "C:\\Filepath";
	char fullPath[500];
	char searchPath[500];
	time_t fileTime;
	time_t maxTime;
	static struct tm currentTime;
	
	strcpy(searchPath, filePath);
	strcat(searchPath, "\\*");
	
	result = GetFirstFile (searchPath, 1, 1, 0, 0, 0, 0, maxName);
	
	strcpy(fullPath, filePath);
	strcat(fullPath, "\\");
	strcat(fullPath, maxName);
	
	GetFileDate (fullPath, &month, &day, &year);
	GetFileTime (fullPath, &hours, &minutes, &seconds);
	
	currentTime.tm_year = year-1900;
	currentTime.tm_mon = month;
	currentTime.tm_mday = day;
	currentTime.tm_hour = hours;
	currentTime.tm_min = minutes;
	currentTime.tm_sec = seconds;
	
	maxTime = mktime (¤tTime);

	while(!result)
	{
		result = GetNextFile (fileName);
		
		strcpy(fullPath, filePath);
		strcat(fullPath, "\\");
		strcat(fullPath, fileName);
		
		GetFileDate (fullPath, &month, &day, &year);
		GetFileTime (fullPath, &hours, &minutes, &seconds);
	
		currentTime.tm_year = year-1900;
		currentTime.tm_mon = month;
		currentTime.tm_mday = day;
		currentTime.tm_hour = hours;
		currentTime.tm_min = minutes;
		currentTime.tm_sec = seconds;
		
		fileTime = mktime (¤tTime);
	
		if(fileTime>maxTime)
		{
			maxTime=fileTime;
			strcpy(maxName, fileName);
		}
	}
	strcpy(fullPath, filePath);
	strcat(fullPath, "\\");
	strcat(fullPath, maxName);

	printf("Newest File: %s\n", maxName);
	printf("Full Path: %s\n", fullPath);
	getchar();
	return 0;
}

You might be able to find a shorter way.

Regards,
Ryan K.

[ryank]

Eh, stupid HTML cut out my includes, the two includes at the top are utility.h and ansi_c.h

[RobertoBozzolo]

The simplest method I know to do this is to use the DIR command redirecting output to a file. Dir command has several options that permit you to:
- select which file(s) consider using standard wildcard caracters and/or file attributes
- select the type and direction of sorting (name, dimension, date, extension; ascending or descending order)
- select which date to consider in sorting (creation, modify or access)

For example:
dir *.c /b /o:-d /t:w > file.txt
creates a file with all source files in the directory, sorted by last access starting from the most recent.

You can next read in the file and use collected informations.