We recently had a client who was used to copying files from one folder to another on their server via a file share from their desktop and not see the date modified information change on those files. However we recently migrated them to a new server and now whenever they copy files from one folder to another, the date modified field is updated to the date and time the files were copied. They don’t like that and wanted an explanation. This is what we told them.
This is a very complex and confusing topic for most people (including many techs) that boils down to date modified metadata is not something that can be relied on only as an indication that the file CONTENTS have been changed but rather something has changed ON the file.
These five items can effect the DATA MODIFED meta data:
The Date Modified metadata that is displayed in the Windows Explorer typically does not change when moving or copying a file on the SAME DRIVE. If files are copied or moved to a different drive (i.e. on the same server or even between PC and Server), the Date Modified can change.
The strangest part of our testing found that if the file being copied has ALREADY been copied once on the server, the date modified does not change but the first time the file is copied when it is on a file share the date modified does change.
You can see this in the screenshot above. The original file was created 2024-06-06 and 10:10am. For testing purposes we COPIED THE COPIES several more times and found, their dates modified did not change.
Microsoft explains it as follows:
This behavior can occur due to differences in how file metadata is handled between local file systems and network shares:
All this means, the DATA MODIFIED changes you reported will occur less often, the more you use the server.
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