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I need to obtain the document properties of every Office file in a folder, for about 35k files. The document properties are NOT the filesystem file properties that Windows Explorer exposes, but those that appear when you select "additional columns". That way you can see Word Count, Author, Number of Pages, Time Last Printed etc. (For media files they usually are Orientation, Bitrate, Resolution, etc.)

I need to export this in a tractable format (csv, Excel or any kind of table).

Example of Windows Explorer with a Word Count column added:

Example of Windows Explorer with a Word Count column added

Example of Windows Explorer column selection UI:

Example of Windows Explorer details column selection UI

Since I'm lazy/don't have time, I'd rather not use VBScript for the task.

How can I do it?

Thanks!

s_a
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  • Product recommendations are off topic on superuser.com – EBGreen Aug 26 '14 at 16:02
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    This is NOT a product recommendation request. I don't know if this can be achieved with a cmd or powershell command. At any rate I would welcome a product recommendation answer like the answers that many, many SU questions receive. Besides, what constitutes a product? I asked for a tool. If I'm pointed to a premade script, does it count as a product? I think you are being over zealous.

    This is a legitimate question and its solution will prove extreamely valuable to many. Please leave it open.

     – s_a Aug 26 '14 at 16:12
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    I am not sure being lazy here is going to be an option. I suspect you are going to have to compose a script. To get you started here is an article on how to get properties for a Word document in Powershell. http://blogs.technet.com/b/heyscriptingguy/archive/2009/12/29/hey-scripting-guy-december-29-2009.aspx – Zoredache Aug 26 '14 at 16:19
  • Based on you stating that you wouldn't consider one scripting language I didn't know that you writing a script in another scripting language was an option. All that left was an existing product. Especially since at the time that I made the vote you had not removed the line asking for a tool. – EBGreen Aug 26 '14 at 16:41
  • I removed that line in order to better comply with the guidelines and in line with your comment. I don't want to write a script myself but using something already written is ok.

    +Zoredache I think there should be better ways to implement it, that script opens a document each time. There are ways that don't involve loading Word 35k times!

     – s_a Aug 26 '14 at 17:00
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    http://metadataminer.com- will this software be useful for you? I have not checked if it is freeware or not. Just out of curiosity, What do u intend to do with the meta data? – Prasanna Aug 26 '14 at 19:14
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    Thanks! For anyone else interested that's exactly what I was looking for.

    At USD 178 though, which is a week's salary here, I think I'll overcome my lazyness and write the script based on this: http://gallery.technet.microsoft.com/scriptcenter/c85e74a4-9c4c-45e0-81cd-b0bd33b2bd2c :)

    Those files come from a database of company documents; I want to check if word count and other indicators are useful as a proxy for time spent working per user, so that I can measure how much work/time different types of documents require and then do some business intelligence.

     – s_a Aug 26 '14 at 19:33
  • possible duplicate of Is there a way to get file metadata from the command line? – agtoever Aug 27 '14 at 13:06

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