Looking For A Specific Solution - Two Larger Directories Into One

[Norwood]

I need a solution that can take two given directories, take random files from each and create a new, smaller directory.

For example Directory "Photos 2011" has 500 pictures in it and "Photos 2012" has 200 pictures.

I would like the program to randomly choose files from each directory and create a directory of those random files into another directory.

To say the least, googling for this is unwieldy. So I'm hoping someone may have needed this solution before and used a particular tool they can recommend.

 

[UsernameIssues]

This can probably be done via a batch file and there are some forum members that could throw something together for you - maybe they will stop by your thread and help you out. In the mean time, you might want to start learning a scripting language (like AutoIt3 or AutoHotKey) so you can cobble some together some code of your own for this task.

 

[Norwood]

Sounds perfect. I love trying to write up something...always finding ways to make my admin life easier. If it can be done with a .bat I could probably figure it out.

Thanks!

 

[Kaktussoft]

Why copy some random files from 2 folders to new folder? Costs a lot of I/O and diskspace.
What do you want to accomplish with that?

 

[UsernameIssues]

...If it can be done with a .bat I could probably figure it out....

The 3rd post here shows the use of random.

 

[Slartybart]

Random slideshow perhaps? There must be an easier / more efficient way.

Peace!

 

[Norwood]

Why copy some random files from 2 folders to new folder?

Why not?

Random Example:

Directory A has REM's discography. About 300,000,000,000 songs.
Directory B has Grateful Dead's discography. Nearly 400,000,000,000 songs.

Instead of picking files individually, pressing Ctrl C, navigating to Directory C and pressing Ctrl V (or even dragging and dropping) it would be much easier to automate it.

Did you have a solution, or did you just want to know what I was doing?

 

[Trucidation]

Knowing what you are trying to do can help people figure out alternative solutions if necessary.

In your example (song playlist?), it would be far more efficient for a media player to do this (select files randomly) rather than have the underlying file system copy files at random.

 

[Norwood]

If artist A has 400 songs and artist B has 11...I don't want those two mixed together.

Not an even mix...or in the industry "enough artist separation".

A script can handle it fine.

 

[Slartybart]

@Norwood - I don't know of any software or script that does what you want. It sounds as though you're looking for a custom program or script to do random selection based on certain criteria (number of songs in a directory).

You might find something on Source Forge.net or Download.com, you'll have to look around though because you want specific functionality.

Good luck.