One standard operation we currently have to do manually when encrypting, decrypting, unzipping and zipping files is to set the CreateDate and/or LastModTime file properties to what the original file was so that we retain the age of the file for maintenance jobs that archive, delete or encrypt files of a certain age.

If I have a file that was created and last modified a 9 months ago and I zip it up or encrypt it the new file will have today's timestamp.
In some cases we have laws, regulations or customer agreements about file and data retention periods that drive file purging or archiving.

We currently do all this with .NET scripts or PowerShell, but it would be so nice to have one of these features enhanced, or perhaps create a new Task to satisfy the desired effect:

• Enhance existing Touch File task to have the ability to set the date time to a hard coded value or the value of a variable. Currently Touch just sets the datetime to Now()
  
• Enhance the Set Attributes Task so we can set File Properties such as Create Date, Last Modified Date, etc. Currently it just lets you change properties such as Read-Only, Hidden, System, and Archive attributes.
  
• Enhance the PGP - Encrypt Task to have a checkbox that says something like "Preserve unencrypted file timestamp".
  
• Enhance the PGP - Decrypt Task to have a checkbox that says something like "Preserve internal encrypted file timestamp".
  
• Enhance the Archive - Extract Task to have a checkbox that says something like "Preserve timestamp(s) of file(s) inside Archive".
  

Or perhaps a new Set File Properties Task that could set DateTime properties. You currently have tasks for Setting file attributes, file permissions, file owner, file name, but not file timestamps (other than to Now() using Touch File Task), I think it would make a great enhancement for a real bread and butter every day need.

Jason,

I whole heartedly agree with your request "Enhance the Archive - Extract Task to have a checkbox that says something like "Preserve timestamp(s) of file(s) inside Archive". "

We have to preserve actual create and modified dates on files even if they have been archived and then unpacked.. The VisualCron task that unpacks puts the process datetime on the unpacked files. It is a requirement for us that we can opt to preserve all original datetime attributes on these files.

Oddly, this feature exists for SFTP file transport already.. so in our case we are pulling down an archive and retaining the original datetime on the archive itself, but when we unpack, the extracted files original datetime stamps are lost.

I will post an additional feature request for this and hopefully there will be an enhancement in the future to meet this need.