Powershell v2 and Sharepoint 2007 - Empty huge recycle bin - HOW?

Question

Hi all
I need to delete the First and Second stage Recycle bin for all of our personal sites, as the total size of these has somehow exceeded 140GB.
I am however stuck as to how to do this. I have tried lots of Powershell scripts to get this done, but nothing has worked. I also tried to just switch off the Recycle Bin but this operation just times out, as the Bin is too large now for this to work.
My most recent Powershell script that I tried is the only one that didnt throw any errors and seemed to do something for about 6 seconds, but checking the recycle bin for the site I tried it against shows that it is still full:
param([string]$Url, [switch]$help)
[void][System.Reflection.Assembly]::LoadWithPartialName("Microsoft.SharePoint")
function GetHelp()
$HelpText = @"
DESCRIPTION:
NAME: Remove-SPSiteSecondStageRecycleBin
Empties the second-stage recycle bin for a Microsoft.SharePoint.SPSite Collection
PARAMETERS:
-url Url to SharePoint Site Collection
SYNTAX:
Remove-SPSiteSecondStageRecycleBin -url http://ansafile
Empties the second stage recycle bin for the SiteCollection.
Remove-SPSiteSecondStageRecycleBin -help
Displays the help topic for the script
$HelpText
function Remove-SPSiteSecondStageRecycleBin([string]$url)
$siteCollection = New-Object Microsoft.SharePoint.SPSite($url);
$recycleQuery = New-Object Microsoft.SharePoint.SPRecycleBinQuery;
$recycleQuery.ItemState = [Microsoft.SharePoint.SPRecycleBinItemState]::SecondStageRecycleBin;
$recycleQuery.OrderBy = [Microsoft.SharePoint.SPRecycleBinOrderBy]::Default;
$recycledItems = $siteCollection.GetRecycleBinItems($recycleQuery);
$count = $recycledItems.Count;
for($i = 0; $i -lt $count; $i++)
$g = New-Object System.Guid($recycledItems[$i].ID);
$recycledItems.Delete($g);
$siteCollection.Dispose()
if($help) { GetHelp; Continue }
if($url) { Remove-SPSiteSecondStageRecycleBin -url $url }
After pressing Enter after adding the above, I then entered the below into Powershell:
Remove-SPSiteSecondStageRecycleBin -url http://ansafile
This seemed to do something, but not what I needed it to do, ie delete the recycle bin for the whole sharepoint installation. ANSAFILE is the internal name of the Sharepoint site. Also, I am using Powershell v2, in an ISE window. My server is running Windows
Server 2008 Std x64 edition. Sharepoint version is 12.0.0.6565
Hopefully someone can help, as I have never used Powershell before, and had to take over the Sharepoint which I have never done before either, and its a bit of a struggle
Thanks to all
Naz

Answer 1

Hi, I just tried the following Powershell script:
Add-PSSnapin Microsoft.SharePoint.PowerShell
$WebApp=get-spwebapplication "http://ansafile"
foreach ($SPSite in $webApp.Sites)
#get the collection of webs
foreach($SPWeb in $SPSite.AllWebs)
#Empty the 1st Stage Recycle bin items PERMENANTLY
#$SPWeb.RecycleBin.DeleteAll();
#Send the 1st Stage Recycle bin items to 2nd Stage
$SPWeb.RecycleBin.MoveAllToSecondStage();
write-host "End-User Recycle Bin Items Deleted for:"
write-host $SPWeb.title ":" $SPWeb.URL "`n"
#Empty SharePoint site collection recycle bin (Second Stage Recycle bin) or Admin Recycle bin
#$SPSite.RecycleBin.DeleteAll();
#write-host "Administrator Recycle bin Items Deleted for:" $SPSite.RootWeb.title "`n"
However, this results in the following error:
Add-PSSnapin : The Windows PowerShell snap-in 'Microsoft.SharePoint.PowerShell' is not installed on this machine.
At line:1 char:13
+ Add-PSSnapin <<<< Microsoft.SharePoint.PowerShell
+ CategoryInfo : InvalidArgument: (Microsoft.SharePoint.PowerShell:String) [Add-PSSnapin], PSArgumentException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : AddPSSnapInRead,Microsoft.PowerShell.Commands.AddPSSnapinCommand
The term 'get-spwebapplication' is not recognized as the name of a cmdlet, function, script file, or operable program. Check the spelling of the name, or if a path was included,
verify that the path is correct and try again.
At line:3 char:29
+ $WebApp=get-spwebapplication <<<< "http://ansafile"
+ CategoryInfo : ObjectNotFound: (get-spwebapplication:String) [], CommandNotFoundException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : CommandNotFoundException
You cannot call a method on a null-valued expression.
At line:14 char:52
+ $SPWeb.RecycleBin.MoveAllToSecondStage <<<< ();
+ CategoryInfo : InvalidOperation: (MoveAllToSecondStage:String) [], RuntimeException
+ FullyQualifiedErrorId : InvokeMethodOnNull
Does this mean I need to install something called cmdlets?
Thanks
Naz