PowerShell

Get a Remote File's Creation Time

Demonstrates the Chilkat SFtp.GetFileCreateTimeStr method, which returns a remote file's creation date and time. The arguments are the remote path (or handle), whether symbolic links are followed, and whether the first argument is a handle.

Background: Creation time is the least universally available of the three timestamps: many Unix filesystems historically tracked only modified and accessed times, so a server may return nothing or a placeholder. Where it is supported it is genuinely useful — it does not change when a file is edited, unlike the modified time — but code should tolerate its absence rather than depend on it.

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Add-Type -Path "C:\chilkat\ChilkatDotNet47-x64\ChilkatDotNet47.dll"

$success = $false

#  Demonstrates the SFtp.GetFileCreateTimeStr method, which returns a remote file's creation date
#  and time.  The 1st argument is the remote path (or handle), the 2nd selects whether symbolic
#  links are followed, and the 3rd indicates whether the 1st argument is a handle.

$sftp = New-Object Chilkat.SFtp

#  Connect, authenticate, and initialize the SFTP subsystem.
$port = 22
$success = $sftp.Connect("sftp.example.com",$port)
if ($success -eq $false) {
    $($sftp.LastErrorText)
    exit
}

#  Normally you would not hard-code the password in source.  You should instead obtain it
#  from an interactive prompt, environment variable, or a secrets vault.
$password = "mySshPassword"

$success = $sftp.AuthenticatePw("mySshLogin",$password)
if ($success -eq $false) {
    $($sftp.LastErrorText)
    exit
}

$success = $sftp.InitializeSftp()
if ($success -eq $false) {
    $($sftp.LastErrorText)
    exit
}

#  The 2nd argument (bFollowLinks) selects whether a symbolic link is followed to its target.
#  The 3rd argument (bIsHandle) is $false here because the 1st argument is a path, not an
#  open handle.
$bFollowLinks = $true
$bIsHandle = $false

$createTime = $sftp.GetFileCreateTimeStr("subdir/report.pdf",$bFollowLinks,$bIsHandle)
if ($sftp.LastMethodSuccess -eq $false) {
    $($sftp.LastErrorText)
    exit
}

$("Created: " + $createTime)

#  Note: Not all servers and filesystems record a creation time.

$sftp.Disconnect()