VBA producing most recently modified .XLS file in a folder - vba

Question

What VBA code can I use to use a folder path displayed in a cell to retrieve the most recently modified .xls file within that folder? So far, I have filenames showing but not the correct files:
Function GetFileNames(ByVal FolderPath As String) As Variant
Dim Result As Variant
Dim i As Integer
Dim MyFile As Object
Dim MyFSO As Object
Dim MyFolder As Object
Dim MyFiles As Object
Set MyFSO = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")
Set MyFolder = MyFSO.GetFolder(FolderPath)
Set MyFiles = MyFolder.Files
ReDim Result(1 To MyFiles.Count)
i = 1
For Each MyFile In MyFiles
Result(i) = MyFile.Name
i = i + 1
Next MyFile
GetFileNames = Result
End Function

Answer 1

I think that what you are looking for is something like the selected answer for this question.
You could adapt the code to fit your specific needs of passing the argument inside the like the function below. Note that the argument directory must include the backward slash at the end (eg. "C:\Users\").
Function NewestFile(Directory As String) As String
'PURPOSE: Get the newest file name from specified directory
Dim FileName As String
Dim MostRecentFile As String
Dim MostRecentDate As Date
Dim FileSpec As String
'Specify the file type, if any
FileSpec = "*.xls"
FileName = Dir(Directory & FileSpec)
If FileName <> "" Then
MostRecentFile = FileName
MostRecentDate = FileDateTime(Directory & FileName)
Do While FileName <> ""
If FileDateTime(Directory & FileName) > MostRecentDate Then
MostRecentFile = FileName
MostRecentDate = FileDateTime(Directory & FileName)
End If
FileName = Dir
Loop
End If
NewestFile = MostRecentFile
End Function
EDIT: For more flexibility, you can also add the option (like in PeterT's revised answer) to search for another type of file with the optional FileSpec argument like in the alternative function below. For this function, if you don't provide any value for FileSpec, it will look at all files.
Function NewestFile(ByVal Directory As String, Optional ByVal FileSpec As String = "*.*") As String
'PURPOSE: Get the newest .xls file name from
Dim FileName As String
Dim MostRecentFile As String
Dim MostRecentDate As Date
'Specify the file type, if any
FileName = Dir(Directory & FileSpec)
If FileName <> "" Then
MostRecentFile = FileName
MostRecentDate = FileDateTime(Directory & FileName)
Do While FileName <> ""
If FileDateTime(Directory & FileName) > MostRecentDate Then
MostRecentFile = FileName
MostRecentDate = FileDateTime(Directory & FileName)
End If
FileName = Dir
Loop
End If
NewestFile = MostRecentFile
End Function
Speed issue: Dir Function vs FileSystemObject
In terms of speed, if the folder you want to look at contains a small number of files, the 2 methods will give you the same results in roughly the same amount of time. However, if you have a lot of files in that folder, using the Dir Function approach instead of the FileSystemObject should speed up greatly the execution of your macro. I haven't tested it, but that seems to be what was concluded from the answers in this question.

Answer 2

You just need to check the DateLastModified timestamp of each file in the folder. A quick check to see if it's the most recent will "sort" it to the top.
Option Explicit
Sub test()
Debug.Print "most recently modified file is " & GetNewestModifiedFilename("C:\Temp")
End Sub
Function GetNewestModifiedFilename(ByVal folderPath As String, _
Optional fileType As String = "xls*") As String
Dim MyFSO As Object
Dim MyFolder As Object
Dim MyFiles As Object
Set MyFSO = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")
Set MyFolder = MyFSO.GetFolder(folderPath)
Set MyFiles = MyFolder.Files
Dim mostRecentFilename As String
Dim mostRecentTimestamp As Date
Dim MyFile As Object
For Each MyFile In MyFiles
Debug.Print MyFile.Name & ", modified " & MyFile.DateLastModified
If Mid(MyFile.Name, InStrRev(MyFile.Name, ".") + 1) Like fileType Then
If MyFile.DateLastModified > mostRecentTimestamp Then
mostRecentFilename = MyFile.Name
mostRecentTimestamp = MyFile.DateLastModified
End If
End If
Next MyFile
GetNewestModifiedFilename = mostRecentFilename
End Function