Progress during large file copy (Copy-Item & Write-Progress?)

Powershell Progress Bar Progress Copying Copy Item

Powershell Problem Overview

Is there any way to copy a really large file (from one server to another) in PowerShell AND display its progress?

There are solutions out there to use Write-Progress in conjunction with looping to copy many files and display progress. However I can't seem to find anything that would show progress of a single file.

Any thoughts?

Powershell Solutions

Solution 1 - Powershell

It seems like a much better solution to just use BitsTransfer, it seems to come OOTB on most Windows machines with PowerShell 2.0 or greater.

Import-Module BitsTransfer
Start-BitsTransfer -Source $Source -Destination $Destination -Description "Backup" -DisplayName "Backup"

Solution 2 - Powershell

I haven't heard about progress with Copy-Item. If you don't want to use any external tool, you can experiment with streams. The size of buffer varies, you may try different values (from 2kb to 64kb).

function Copy-File {
    param( [string]$from, [string]$to)
    $ffile = [io.file]::OpenRead($from)
    $tofile = [io.file]::OpenWrite($to)
    Write-Progress -Activity "Copying file" -status "$from -> $to" -PercentComplete 0
    try {
        [byte[]]$buff = new-object byte[] 4096
        [long]$total = [int]$count = 0
        do {
            $count = $ffile.Read($buff, 0, $buff.Length)
            $tofile.Write($buff, 0, $count)
            $total += $count
            if ($total % 1mb -eq 0) {
                Write-Progress -Activity "Copying file" -status "$from -> $to" `
                   -PercentComplete ([long]($total * 100 / $ffile.Length))
            }
        } while ($count -gt 0)
    }
    finally {
        $ffile.Dispose()
        $tofile.Dispose()
        Write-Progress -Activity "Copying file" -Status "Ready" -Completed
    }
}

Solution 3 - Powershell

Alternativly this option uses the native windows progress bar...

$FOF_CREATEPROGRESSDLG = "&H0&"
 
$objShell = New-Object -ComObject "Shell.Application"
 
$objFolder = $objShell.NameSpace($DestLocation) 

$objFolder.CopyHere($srcFile, $FOF_CREATEPROGRESSDLG)

Solution 4 - Powershell

cmd /c copy /z src dest

not pure PowerShell, but executable in PowerShell and it displays progress in percents

Solution 5 - Powershell

I amended the code from stej (which was great, just what i needed!) to use larger buffer, [long] for larger files and used System.Diagnostics.Stopwatch class to track elapsed time and estimate time remaining.

Also added reporting of transfer rate during transfer and outputting overall elapsed time and overall transfer rate.

Using 4MB (4096*1024 bytes) buffer to get better than Win7 native throughput copying from NAS to USB stick on laptop over wifi.

On To-Do list:

add error handling (catch)
handle get-childitem file list as input
nested progress bars when copying multiple files (file x of y, % if total data copied etc)
input parameter for buffer size

Feel free to use/improve :-)

function Copy-File {
param( [string]$from, [string]$to)
$ffile = [io.file]::OpenRead($from)
$tofile = [io.file]::OpenWrite($to)
Write-Progress `
    -Activity "Copying file" `
    -status ($from.Split("\")|select -last 1) `
    -PercentComplete 0
try {
    $sw = [System.Diagnostics.Stopwatch]::StartNew();
    [byte[]]$buff = new-object byte[] (4096*1024)
    [long]$total = [long]$count = 0
    do {
        $count = $ffile.Read($buff, 0, $buff.Length)
        $tofile.Write($buff, 0, $count)
        $total += $count
        [int]$pctcomp = ([int]($total/$ffile.Length* 100));
        [int]$secselapsed = [int]($sw.elapsedmilliseconds.ToString())/1000;
        if ( $secselapsed -ne 0 ) {
            [single]$xferrate = (($total/$secselapsed)/1mb);
        } else {
            [single]$xferrate = 0.0
        }
        if ($total % 1mb -eq 0) {
            if($pctcomp -gt 0)`
                {[int]$secsleft = ((($secselapsed/$pctcomp)* 100)-$secselapsed);
                } else {
                [int]$secsleft = 0};
            Write-Progress `
                -Activity ($pctcomp.ToString() + "% Copying file @ " + "{0:n2}" -f $xferrate + " MB/s")`
                -status ($from.Split("\")|select -last 1) `
                -PercentComplete $pctcomp `
                -SecondsRemaining $secsleft;
        }
    } while ($count -gt 0)
$sw.Stop();
$sw.Reset();
}
finally {
    write-host (($from.Split("\")|select -last 1) + `
     " copied in " + $secselapsed + " seconds at " + `
     "{0:n2}" -f [int](($ffile.length/$secselapsed)/1mb) + " MB/s.");
     $ffile.Close();
     $tofile.Close();
    }
}

Solution 6 - Powershell

Not that I'm aware of. I wouldn't recommend using copy-item for this anyway. I don't think it has been designed to be robust like robocopy.exe to support retry which you would want for extremely large file copies over the network.

Solution 7 - Powershell

Hate to be the one to bump an old subject, but I found this post extremely useful. After running performance tests on the snippets by stej and it's refinement by Graham Gold, plus the BITS suggestion by Nacht, I have decuded that:

I really liked Graham's command with time estimations and speed readings.
I also really liked the significant speed increase of using BITS as my transfer method.

Faced with the decision between the two... I found that Start-BitsTransfer supported Asynchronous mode. So here is the result of my merging the two.

function Copy-File {
    # ref: https://stackoverflow.com/a/55527732/3626361
    param([string]$From, [string]$To)

    try {
        $job = Start-BitsTransfer -Source $From -Destination $To `
            -Description "Moving: $From => $To" `
            -DisplayName "Backup" -Asynchronous

        # Start stopwatch
        $sw = [System.Diagnostics.Stopwatch]::StartNew()
        Write-Progress -Activity "Connecting..."

        while ($job.JobState.ToString() -ne "Transferred") {
            switch ($job.JobState.ToString()) {
                "Connecting" {
                    break
                }
                "Transferring" {
                    $pctcomp = ($job.BytesTransferred / $job.BytesTotal) * 100
                    $elapsed = ($sw.elapsedmilliseconds.ToString()) / 1000

                    if ($elapsed -eq 0) {
                        $xferrate = 0.0
                    }
                    else {
                        $xferrate = (($job.BytesTransferred / $elapsed) / 1mb);
                    }

                    if ($job.BytesTransferred % 1mb -eq 0) {
                        if ($pctcomp -gt 0) {
                            $secsleft = ((($elapsed / $pctcomp) * 100) - $elapsed)
                        }
                        else {
                            $secsleft = 0
                        }

                        Write-Progress -Activity ("Copying file '" + ($From.Split("\") | Select-Object -last 1) + "' @ " + "{0:n2}" -f $xferrate + "MB/s") `
                            -PercentComplete $pctcomp `
                            -SecondsRemaining $secsleft
                    }
                    break
                }
                "Transferred" {
                    break
                }
                Default {
                    throw $job.JobState.ToString() + " unexpected BITS state."
                }
            }
        }

        $sw.Stop()
        $sw.Reset()
    }
    finally {
        Complete-BitsTransfer -BitsJob $job
        Write-Progress -Activity "Completed" -Completed
    }
}

Solution 8 - Powershell

i found none of the examples above met my needs, i wanted to copy a directory with sub directories, the problem is my source directory had too many files so i quickly hit the BITS file limit (i had > 1500 file) also the total directory size was quite large.

i found a function using robocopy that was a good starting point at https://keithga.wordpress.com/2014/06/23/copy-itemwithprogress/, however i found it wasn't quite robust enough, it didn't handle trailing slashes, spaces gracefully and did not stop the copy when the script was halted.

Here is my refined version:

function Copy-ItemWithProgress
{
    <#
    .SYNOPSIS
    RoboCopy with PowerShell progress.
    
    .DESCRIPTION
    Performs file copy with RoboCopy. Output from RoboCopy is captured,
    parsed, and returned as Powershell native status and progress.
    
    .PARAMETER Source
    Directory to copy files from, this should not contain trailing slashes

    .PARAMETER Destination
    DIrectory to copy files to, this should not contain trailing slahes

    .PARAMETER FilesToCopy
    A wildcard expresion of which files to copy, defaults to *.*

    .PARAMETER RobocopyArgs
    List of arguments passed directly to Robocopy.
    Must not conflict with defaults: /ndl /TEE /Bytes /NC /nfl /Log
    
    .PARAMETER ProgressID
    When specified (>=0) will use this identifier for the progress bar

    .PARAMETER ParentProgressID
    When specified (>= 0) will use this identifier as the parent ID for progress bars
    so that they appear nested which allows for usage in more complex scripts.

    .OUTPUTS
    Returns an object with the status of final copy.
    REMINDER: Any error level below 8 can be considered a success by RoboCopy.
    
    .EXAMPLE
    C:\PS> .\Copy-ItemWithProgress c:\Src d:\Dest
    
    Copy the contents of the c:\Src directory to a directory d:\Dest
    Without the /e or /mir switch, only files from the root of c:\src are copied.
    
    .EXAMPLE
    C:\PS> .\Copy-ItemWithProgress '"c:\Src Files"' d:\Dest /mir /xf *.log -Verbose
    
    Copy the contents of the 'c:\Name with Space' directory to a directory d:\Dest
    /mir and /XF parameters are passed to robocopy, and script is run verbose
    
    .LINK
    https://keithga.wordpress.com/2014/06/23/copy-itemwithprogress
    
    .NOTES
    By Keith S. Garner ([email protected]) - 6/23/2014
    With inspiration by Trevor Sullivan @pcgeek86
    Tweaked by Justin Marshall - 02/20/2020
    
    #>
    
    [CmdletBinding()]
    param(
        [Parameter(Mandatory=$true)]
        [string]$Source,
        [Parameter(Mandatory=$true)]
        [string]$Destination,
    	[Parameter(Mandatory=$false)]
        [string]$FilesToCopy="*.*",
    	[Parameter(Mandatory = $true,ValueFromRemainingArguments=$true)] 
    	[string[]] $RobocopyArgs,
        [int]$ParentProgressID=-1,
        [int]$ProgressID=-1
    )
    
    #handle spaces and trailing slashes
    $SourceDir = '"{0}"' -f ($Source -replace "\\+$","")
    $TargetDir = '"{0}"' -f ($Destination -replace "\\+$","")
    
    
    $ScanLog  = [IO.Path]::GetTempFileName()
    $RoboLog  = [IO.Path]::GetTempFileName()
    $ScanArgs = @($SourceDir,$TargetDir,$FilesToCopy) + $RobocopyArgs + "/ndl /TEE /bytes /Log:$ScanLog /nfl /L".Split(" ")
    $RoboArgs = @($SourceDir,$TargetDir,$FilesToCopy) + $RobocopyArgs + "/ndl /TEE /bytes /Log:$RoboLog /NC".Split(" ")
    
    # Launch Robocopy Processes
    write-verbose ("Robocopy Scan:`n" + ($ScanArgs -join " "))
    write-verbose ("Robocopy Full:`n" + ($RoboArgs -join " "))
    $ScanRun = start-process robocopy -PassThru -WindowStyle Hidden -ArgumentList $ScanArgs
    try
    {
        $RoboRun = start-process robocopy -PassThru -WindowStyle Hidden -ArgumentList $RoboArgs
        try
        {
            # Parse Robocopy "Scan" pass
            $ScanRun.WaitForExit()
            $LogData = get-content $ScanLog
            if ($ScanRun.ExitCode -ge 8)
            {
    	        $LogData|out-string|Write-Error
    	        throw "Robocopy $($ScanRun.ExitCode)"
            }
            $FileSize = [regex]::Match($LogData[-4],".+:\s+(\d+)\s+(\d+)").Groups[2].Value
            write-verbose ("Robocopy Bytes: $FileSize `n" +($LogData -join "`n"))
            #determine progress parameters
            $ProgressParms=@{}
            if ($ParentProgressID -ge 0) {
                $ProgressParms['ParentID']=$ParentProgressID
            }
            if ($ProgressID -ge 0) {
                $ProgressParms['ID']=$ProgressID
            } else {
                $ProgressParms['ID']=$RoboRun.Id
            }
            # Monitor Full RoboCopy
            while (!$RoboRun.HasExited)
            {
    	        $LogData = get-content $RoboLog
    	        $Files = $LogData -match "^\s*(\d+)\s+(\S+)"
                if ($null -ne $Files )
                {
    	            $copied = ($Files[0..($Files.Length-2)] | ForEach-Object {$_.Split("`t")[-2]} | Measure-Object -sum).Sum
    	            if ($LogData[-1] -match "(100|\d?\d\.\d)\%")
    	            {
    		            write-progress Copy -ParentID $ProgressParms['ID'] -percentComplete $LogData[-1].Trim("% `t") $LogData[-1]
    		            $Copied += $Files[-1].Split("`t")[-2] /100 * ($LogData[-1].Trim("% `t"))
    	            }
    	            else
    	            {
    		            write-progress Copy -ParentID $ProgressParms['ID'] -Complete
    	            }
    	            write-progress ROBOCOPY  -PercentComplete ($Copied/$FileSize*100) $Files[-1].Split("`t")[-1] @ProgressParms
                }
            }
        } finally {
            if (!$RoboRun.HasExited) {Write-Warning "Terminating copy process with ID $($RoboRun.Id)..."; $RoboRun.Kill() ; }
            $RoboRun.WaitForExit()
            # Parse full RoboCopy pass results, and cleanup
            (get-content $RoboLog)[-11..-2] | out-string | Write-Verbose
            remove-item $RoboLog
            write-output ([PSCustomObject]@{ ExitCode = $RoboRun.ExitCode })
                
        }
    } finally {
        if (!$ScanRun.HasExited) {Write-Warning "Terminating scan process with ID $($ScanRun.Id)..."; $ScanRun.Kill() }
        $ScanRun.WaitForExit()
        
        remove-item $ScanLog
    }
}

Solution 9 - Powershell

This recursive function copies files and directories recursively from source path to destination path

If file already exists on destination path, it copies them only with newer files.

Function Copy-FilesBitsTransfer(
        [Parameter(Mandatory=$true)][String]$sourcePath, 
        [Parameter(Mandatory=$true)][String]$destinationPath, 
        [Parameter(Mandatory=$false)][bool]$createRootDirectory = $true)
{
    $item = Get-Item $sourcePath
    $itemName = Split-Path $sourcePath -leaf
    if (!$item.PSIsContainer){ #Item Is a file

        $clientFileTime = Get-Item $sourcePath | select LastWriteTime -ExpandProperty LastWriteTime

        if (!(Test-Path -Path $destinationPath\$itemName)){
            Start-BitsTransfer -Source $sourcePath -Destination $destinationPath -Description "$sourcePath >> $destinationPath" -DisplayName "Copy Template file" -Confirm:$false
            if (!$?){
                return $false
            }
        }
        else{
            $serverFileTime = Get-Item $destinationPath\$itemName | select LastWriteTime -ExpandProperty LastWriteTime

            if ($serverFileTime -lt $clientFileTime)
            {
                Start-BitsTransfer -Source $sourcePath -Destination $destinationPath -Description "$sourcePath >> $destinationPath" -DisplayName "Copy Template file" -Confirm:$false
                if (!$?){
                    return $false
                }
            }
        }
    }
    else{ #Item Is a directory
        if ($createRootDirectory){
            $destinationPath = "$destinationPath\$itemName"
            if (!(Test-Path -Path $destinationPath -PathType Container)){
                if (Test-Path -Path $destinationPath -PathType Leaf){ #In case item is a file, delete it.
                    Remove-Item -Path $destinationPath
                }

                New-Item -ItemType Directory $destinationPath | Out-Null
                if (!$?){
                    return $false
                }

            }
        }
        Foreach ($fileOrDirectory in (Get-Item -Path "$sourcePath\*"))
        {
            $status = Copy-FilesBitsTransfer $fileOrDirectory $destinationPath $true
            if (!$status){
                return $false
            }
        }
    }

    return $true
}

Solution 10 - Powershell

Trevor Sullivan has a write-up on how to add a command called Copy-ItemWithProgress to PowerShell on Robocopy.

Solution 11 - Powershell

Sean Kearney from the Hey, Scripting Guy! Blog has a solution I found works pretty nicely.

Function Copy-WithProgress
{
    [CmdletBinding()]
    Param
    (
        [Parameter(Mandatory=$true,
            ValueFromPipelineByPropertyName=$true,
            Position=0)]
        $Source,
        [Parameter(Mandatory=$true,
            ValueFromPipelineByPropertyName=$true,
            Position=0)]
        $Destination
    )

    $Source=$Source.tolower()
    $Filelist=Get-Childitem "$Source" –Recurse
    $Total=$Filelist.count
    $Position=0

    foreach ($File in $Filelist)
    {
        $Filename=$File.Fullname.tolower().replace($Source,'')
        $DestinationFile=($Destination+$Filename)
        Write-Progress -Activity "Copying data from '$source' to '$Destination'" -Status "Copying File $Filename" -PercentComplete (($Position/$total)*100)
        Copy-Item $File.FullName -Destination $DestinationFile
        $Position++
    }
}

Then to use it:

Copy-WithProgress -Source $src -Destination $dest

Content Type	Original Author	Original Content on Stackoverflow
Question	Jason Jarrett	View Question on Stackoverflow
Solution 1 - Powershell	Nacht	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 2 - Powershell	stej	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 3 - Powershell	Chris M	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 4 - Powershell	Jirka Jr.	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 5 - Powershell	Graham Gold	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 6 - Powershell	Keith Hill	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 7 - Powershell	Shane	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 8 - Powershell	Justin	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 9 - Powershell	Dudi72	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 10 - Powershell	Wouter	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 11 - Powershell	E-rich	View Answer on Stackoverflow