Is There a difference between 'past' and 'last' in these sentences:
Search these files on past year archive
Search these files on last year archive
Answer
In this particular usage, the context is probably sufficient that people would interpret them to mean the same thing, although that thing isn't precisely clear, especially in the absence of articles. But "past" and "last" can potentially refer to different things.
"Last year" refers to the most recent previous year. That could be the 365 days before today, the 12 months before this month, or the preceding calendar year (i.e., 2016 as of now). "Last year" should either have an article (likely "the" in this example, although you could construe a situation where "a" might apply), or it could be made possessive ("last year's archive").
"Past year" can refer to any previous year. That would include everything "last year" could refer to plus any year before the most recent one. If used with "the", the meaning is similar to "last year". If used with "a", it could include any prior year. So "past year" really needs an article for clarity.
BTW, "this" refers to something singular and "files" is plural. The sentence should refer to "these files".
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