Remove Logs

A couple of our web servers were running into some issues with disk space. Turns out the logs weren’t being cleaned up properly.
In order to remediate this, I wrote a function that can be reused anywhere.

The function accepts 3 parameters:

• FilePath: The directory where you want to remove the logs from
• CutOff; Specifies the age (in days) that a file must have before being deleted.
• LogPath; This parameter specifies the directory where you want the CSV log file. If this is left open, no CSV will be saved.

Example

As an example, I’m going to remove all files, older than 30 days, from the folder “C:\temp\W3SVC2030036971\W3SVC2030036971". I want a CSV log to be written in the “C:\temp” folder.

As you can see, you always get feedback in your window, even if you don’t specify a log path.

The CSV looks something like this:

Code

You can find the script code below. This is provided as-is. You can find the most recent version of the code on GitHub.

  #Requires -Version 3.0

  Function Remove-Logs{ 

  <#
  .SYNOPSIS
    Delete old log files
  .DESCRIPTION
    This function will delete all .log and .txt files older than a certain number of days.
    You have the ability to specify log path, extension (log or txt) and path.
  .NOTES
    Author:  Maarten Van Driessen
  .PARAMETER FilePath
    Specify the path where you want to delete the logs from.
  .PARAMETER CutOff
    Specify how many days you want to go back.
  .PARAMETER LogPath
    Where do you want to store the log file. Path must end with a \
  .PARAMETER FileExtension
    Specify whether you want to delete *.log, *.etl or *.txt files. If left blank, the function will delete both.
    Must be written as *.log, *.etl or *.txt
  .EXAMPLE
    Remove-Logs -FilePath C:\inetpub\ -Cutoff 30 -LogPath c:\temp\
    
    Delete all txt and log files older than 30 days from the c:\inetpub folder and write the log to c:\reports
  .EXAMPLE
    Remove-Logs -FilePath C:\inetpub\ -Cutoff 20 -LogPath c:\temp\ -Filter *.txt
    
    Delete all txt files older than 20 days from the c:\inetpub folder and write the log to c:\reports
  # <

  [Cmdletbinding()]
  #Parameters
  Param
  (
      #Check to see if there are any invalid characters in the path
      [Parameter(Mandatory=$true)][ValidateScript({
              If ((Split-Path $_ -Leaf).IndexOfAny([io.path]::GetInvalidFileNameChars()) -ge 0) {
                  Throw "$(Split-Path $_ -Leaf) contains invalid characters!"
              } Else {$True}
          })][string]$FilePath,
      #You can only delete logs older than 1 day
      [Parameter(Mandatory=$true)][ValidateRange(1,365)][int]$Cutoff,
      #Check to see if there are any invalid characters in the path
      [ValidateScript({
              If ((Split-Path $_ -Leaf).IndexOfAny([io.path]::GetInvalidFileNameChars()) -ge 0) {
                  Throw "$(Split-Path $_ -Leaf) contains invalid characters!"
              } Elseif(-Not ($_.EndsWith('\'))){
                  Throw "Logpath must end with \ !"
              } Else {$True}
          })]$LogPath="",  
      
      #you can only delete log and txt files
      [ValidateSet("*.log","*.txt","*.etl")][string]$FileExtension ="*.*"
      
  )

      #Check if the file & log path exist
      if(-not (Test-Path $FilePath))
      {
          throw "Invalid file path! Please make sure you enter a valid path."
      }
      #If statement to handle optional parameter
      elseif($LogPath -eq "") {}
      elseif(-not (Test-Path $LogPath))
      {
          throw "Log path does not exist! Please make sure you enter a valid path."
      }

      $CutOffDate = (Get-Date).AddDays(-$Cutoff)

      #Get all items inside the path
      $LogFiles = Get-ChildItem -Path $FilePath -Filter $FileExtension | Where-Object{$_.LastWriteTime -lt $CutOffDate}
      $DeletedItems = @()
      if($LogFiles)
      {
          foreach($LogFile in $LogFiles)
          {
              #Remove all items
              $DeletedItems += $LogFile
              $LogFile | Remove-Item
              Write-Host "Removing file $LogFile" -ForegroundColor Green
          }
          if($LogPath)
          {
              $LogName = Get-Date -Format "yyyy-MM-dd"          
              $DeletedItems | select Name,creationtime,lastwritetime | Export-Csv -path "$LogPath\DeletedLogs - $LogName.csv" -Delimiter ";" -NoTypeInformation -Append
          }
      }
      else 
      {
          Write-Host "No files were found." -ForegroundColor Red
      }
  }