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up vote 2 down vote favorite
1

In my PowerShell script I'm trying to delete a folder, but only if it exists:

if (Test-Path $folder) { Remove-Item $folder -Recurse; }

I find myself repeating this combination of cmdlets quite a few times, and wished I had something like this:

# Pseudo code:
Remove-Item $folder -Recurse -IgnoreNonExistentPaths

Is there a way to do something like that? A different command, or an option I've missed from the Remove-Item documentation perhaps? Or is the only way to DRY out this bit of code to write my own cmdlet that combines Test-Path and Remove-Item?

share|improve this question
    
You may be looking for alias. – Mast May 11 '15 at 9:55
1  
@Mast, an alias is just an alternative name for a command. You can't specify parameters or anything in an alias definition. – Dangph May 12 '15 at 0:53
up vote 6 down vote accepted

I assume you're just trying to avoid the error message in case it doesn't exist.

What if you just ignore it:

Remove-Item $folder -Recurse -ErrorAction Ignore

If that's not what you want, I would recommend writing your own function:

function Remove-ItemSafely {
[CmdletBinding(SupportsShouldProcess=$true)]
param(
    [Parameter(
        Mandatory=$true,
        ValueFromPipeline=$true,
        ValueFromPipelineByPropertyName=$true
    )]
    [String[]]
    $Path ,

    [Switch]
    $Recurse
)

    Process {
        foreach($p in $Path) {
            if(Test-Path $p) {
                Remove-Item $p -Recurse:$Recurse -WhatIf:$WhatIfPreference
            }
        }
    }
}
share|improve this answer
    
7th line from bottom, typo: "P" should be "{". Which doesn't lessen that perfect function. – user1016274 Sep 13 '15 at 18:40
    
@user1016274 thanks, fixed! – briantist Sep 13 '15 at 18:42

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