Home Folder Deletion - Finding 'Orphaned' Home Folders and Deleting Them

[Fazza]

I've got a list from Active Directory of all the home folders in use (i.e. \\servername\staff$\homefoldername) so if I get a directory listing from the server is it possible to do some 'magic' and compare the two things to see which home folders I can safely delete as they are not linked to a current AD account?

 

Or is there another/easier/simpler way of doing this?!

[caffrey]

Scripts

 

I use Orphaned Folder Check 1.1

[HPlum78]

My first thought would be PS:-

 

$UserHomeFldrAD = Get-ADUser -Filter * -Properties HomeDirectory | ?{$_.HomeDirectory -ne $null} | select HomeDirectory

$UserHomeFldrShare = Get-ChildItem -Path \\dev.domain.ac.uk\root\staff\home\a\ -Directory | select FullName

Compare-Object $UserHomeFldrAD $UserHomeFldrShare

 

To be honest its about 5 more lines away from being an automated script......

Edited May 16, 2018 by HPlum78

[Fazza]

Scripts

 

I use Orphaned Folder Check 1.1

 

Just tried and it worked like a dream!

 

398 folders to delete!

[Fazza]

Doesn't look like it works properly as I've just deleted a home folder that this script claims to be an orphaned folder and it isnt as it is 100% definitely in AD.

 

 

 

[EDIT]

 

I think the 'glitch' must be that it's looking at the username and assuming that's the name of the folder in the home folder share which is OK except where someone has had their username changed (i.e. got married) but their home folder hasn't changed.

Edited May 16, 2018 by Fazza

[caffrey]

When people get married here, I create a totally new account and move all the contents of their old home folder to their new one to save confusion

[DavidYoung]

Literally just working on this today. This is my script;

 

$OU = "OU=OU,DC=domain,DC=com"
$rootFolder = "\\server\share\staff"

$users = Get-ADUser -SearchBase $OU -Properties homedirectory -Filter {(Enabled -eq $true)}

$folders = Get-ChildItem -Path $rootFolder

$folders.Count

$liveFolders = @()
$oldFolders = @()

foreach ($folder in $folders.FullName){
   if($users.HomeDirectory -contains $folder){
       write-host $folder -ForegroundColor Green
       $liveFolders += $folder
   }else{
       Write-Host $folder -ForegroundColor Red
       $oldFolders += $folder
   }
}

 

This will create 2 arrays: $livefolders and $oldfolders. You can then use powershell to delete the easily.

 

This looks at the actual homdirectory attribute in AD and doesn't rely on the username matching.

[HPlum78]

Yeah I am with @DavidYoung like I said 5 lines off automation :-P

[Fazza]

Literally just working on this today. This is my script;

 

$OU = "OU=OU,DC=domain,DC=com"
$rootFolder = "\\server\share\staff"

$users = Get-ADUser -SearchBase $OU -Properties homedirectory -Filter {(Enabled -eq $true)}

$folders = Get-ChildItem -Path $rootFolder

$folders.Count

$liveFolders = @()
$oldFolders = @()

foreach ($folder in $folders.FullName){
   if($users.HomeDirectory -contains $folder){
       write-host $folder -ForegroundColor Green
       $liveFolders += $folder
   }else{
       Write-Host $folder -ForegroundColor Red
       $oldFolders += $folder
   }
}

 

This will create 2 arrays: $livefolders and $oldfolders. You can then use powershell to delete the easily.

 

This looks at the actual homdirectory attribute in AD and doesn't rely on the username matching.

 

Is it possible to output the $livefolders and $oldfolders lists to two different text files? I did try but I just got 2 .csv files with lists of numbers in instead of home folder names!!

Edited May 17, 2018 by Fazza

[Fazza]

It gets worse!

 

Years and years and years ago we had Ranger. Ranger had the home folders like this: \\fileserver\username$ but the new (and more correct way) we do it is \\fileserver\staff$\%username%

 

If I run both the scripts I get 2 different sets of results!!

[ShellfishClive]

When people get married here, I create a totally new account and move all the contents of their old home folder to their new one to save confusion

 

That's actually a really clean way of doing it, whenever I change a name I always miss something.

 

[color=#d4d4d4][font=Monaco][color=#569cd6]$[/color][color=#9cdcfe]homeDriveRoot[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#d4d4d4]=[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#ce9178]"\\server\currentstaffdirectory$\"[/color]
[color=#569cd6]$[/color][color=#9cdcfe]leaversRoot[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#d4d4d4]=[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#ce9178]"\\server\movefolderlocation$\"[/color]

[color=#569cd6]$[/color][color=#9cdcfe]folders[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#d4d4d4]=[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#dcdcaa]Get-ChildItem[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#569cd6]$[/color][color=#9cdcfe]homeDriveRoot[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#d4d4d4]|[/color][color=#d4d4d4] Select [/color][color=#d4d4d4]-[/color][color=#d4d4d4]ExpandProperty Name[/color]
[color=#569cd6]$[/color][color=#9cdcfe]activeUsers[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#d4d4d4]=[/color][color=#d4d4d4]  [/color][color=#dcdcaa]Get-ADUser[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#d4d4d4]-[/color][color=#d4d4d4]Filter {Enabled [/color][color=#d4d4d4]-eq[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#569cd6]$true[/color][color=#d4d4d4]} [/color][color=#d4d4d4]|[/color][color=#d4d4d4] Select [/color][color=#d4d4d4]-[/color][color=#d4d4d4]ExpandProperty SamAccountName[/color]
[color=#569cd6]$[/color][color=#9cdcfe]differences[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#d4d4d4]=[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#dcdcaa]Compare-Object[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#d4d4d4]-[/color][color=#d4d4d4]ReferenceObject [/color][color=#569cd6]$[/color][color=#9cdcfe]activeUsers[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#d4d4d4]-[/color][color=#d4d4d4]DifferenceObject [/color][color=#569cd6]$[/color][color=#9cdcfe]folders[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#d4d4d4]|[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#c586c0]?[/color][color=#d4d4d4] {[/color][color=#569cd6]$[/color][color=#d4d4d4]_[/color][color=#dcdcaa].SideIndicator[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#d4d4d4]-eq[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#ce9178]"=>"[/color][color=#d4d4d4]} [/color][color=#d4d4d4]|[/color][color=#d4d4d4] Select [/color][color=#d4d4d4]-[/color][color=#d4d4d4]ExpandProperty InputObject[/color]
[color=#569cd6]$[/color][color=#9cdcfe]differences[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#d4d4d4]|[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#dcdcaa]ForEach-Object[/color][color=#d4d4d4] {[/color][color=#dcdcaa]Move-Item[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#d4d4d4]-[/color][color=#d4d4d4]Path [/color][color=#ce9178]"[/color][color=#569cd6]$[/color][color=#9cdcfe]homeDriveRoot[/color][color=#569cd6]$[/color][color=#9cdcfe]_[/color][color=#ce9178]"[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#d4d4d4]-[/color][color=#d4d4d4]Destination [/color][color=#ce9178]"[/color][color=#569cd6]$[/color][color=#9cdcfe]leaversRoot[/color][color=#569cd6]$[/color][color=#9cdcfe]_[/color][color=#ce9178]"[/color][color=#d4d4d4] [/color][color=#d4d4d4]-[/color][color=#d4d4d4]Force}[/color]

[/font][/color]

 

I wrote that script a while ago, it checks AD for active users. If the user doesn't exist or is disabled then it will move their homefolder to a different location, not sure if that will help but it's there anyway. Just change the top to variables.

 

$homeDriveRoot is where the current active staff home folders are.

$leaversRoot is where you want the folders moving instead of deleting just in case.

[tim7777]

Try this Compare folder list to AD user list - PowerShell for Windows - Ask the Experts - IDERA Community

[Fazza]

All sorted now