Auto-indexing files on a hard drive?

November 7, 2006 4:27 PM

Is there an easy way to automatically generate an MSWord (or text) document that contains the titles and folder structure for all files on a hard drive? In other words, to create an index of a hard drive's contents?

I am trying to create a clean, polished index of everything on a hard drive. The idea is to have a Word document that lists all of the files and includes the folders/subfolders in which they sit (links to the files would be great, but not necessary). This seems like it should be easy to do, but I have not been able to figure out a way. If there is a way to do this without the need to apply any real technical expertise (which I generally lack), all the better.

posted by lionelhutz5 to Computers & Internet (8 answers total)

the DOS tree command? It only gives folders - I'm not sure if you want files listed or not.
posted by niles at 4:33 PM on November 7, 2006

Just kidding - use the /f flag to list files.
posted by niles at 4:34 PM on November 7, 2006

dir c:\ /s /b > foo.txt
If you want to only include directories, you can use:
dir c:\ /s /b /ad > foo.txt
posted by aubilenon at 4:42 PM on November 7, 2006

dos is so forgotten, yet so powerful
posted by caddis at 5:28 PM on November 7, 2006

what you want is:

Start -> run

Type cmd

Browse to the root folder you want to start at. (cd .. takes you up one folder level)

tree /F > tree.txt

Then open that txt file and copy into Word or whatever.
posted by blind.wombat at 5:57 PM on November 7, 2006

Another option: Check out Agent Ransack (download for free, Google it).

Ir can do what you want, along with many other powerful features.
posted by mikeand1 at 12:32 AM on November 8, 2006

Try FolderStyle. It allows you to choose the style of report produced, either a plain text file or HTML files which can include hyperlinks back to the original files.
posted by monkeyforest at 2:11 AM on November 8, 2006

You don't need to install FolderStyle, it's a standalone executable. You can also get it from Portable Freeware.
posted by monkeyforest at 2:37 AM on November 8, 2006