Question

I need to visit a folder and all of its children with SSIS (SQL Server Integration Services). At the moment by setting the folder path into a variable after reading it, I able to loop through all the .txt files of the current folder and fill a pre-generated (with head info) xml file.

What I would need now is to be able to create one per each accessed folder, a new xml file (the beginning content will be always the same). Once I would be able to create it, as first action once a new folder is accessed, I can then simply apply the logic I developed so far.

However I am blocked at the moment, since within the loop where i read the files (with their full path) I cannot find a way to express “create the xml file if the accessed folder is new”.

Answer 1

Assuming I understand the problem, you need to walk the entirety of a directory structure and for each folder you find, you need to create a base XML file. Then for each text file you find in that folder, you will perform some operation on the XML file. The trick being how do you only create the XML file once.

I would envision a process like this.

A script task that makes use of the System.IO.GetDirectories to populate a variable (directoryXML> that contains the folder structure, something like

<Dir>
    <D>C:\ssisdata</D>
    <D>C:\ssisdata\a</D>
    <D>C:\ssidata\a\b</D>
</Dir>

Use a Foreach Nodelist Enumerator to shred that XML out into a variable (currentDirecotry).

You’d perform your one-time task of creating the XML file in currentDirectory.

Further using the currentDirectory variable as an expression on the Foreach File Enumerator (assign to Directory with a FileSpec of *.txt) you can then perform your task on all the files meeting that specification. Do not check the traverse subfolder option as that will not give the desired results.

This is a fairly high level approach to the problem as I’m assuming you have some familiarity with SSIS but the approach should be sound. Let me know if you have any particular sticking points.