the "=" symbol in batch files

[MigrationUser]

30 Mar 2012 07:27
md5

Hello. When I do either of these commands at the prompt:

echo: =
echo: => filename

They appear to funcition with my expectation. The first returns the equal sign if I type <Enter>, and the second pipes the equal sign into "filename".

However, when I do something like this:

for %G in (=) do echo:%G>filename

No matter how many times I escape the equals sign, or not at all, it will not go into "filename". Any ideas on why that would not work? I have not found that problem to occur with any other characters tried so far. Thanks.

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#2 30 Mar 2012 07:46
npocmaka


Shouldn't be:

for /F %G in ("=") do echo:%G>filename

the right command?

I think
for %G (something) do ...
(without command switch and quotes) will iterate through list of files in brackets

Last edited by npocmaka (30 Mar 2012 07:46)

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#3 30 Mar 2012 07:53
md5


Hello.

Yes, my command was correct. For %G in (a b c) do echo:%G>filename. Try it yourself and see.

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#5 31 Mar 2012 00:32
RG


As npocmaka stated...

Code: Select all

for /f %G in ("=") do echo.%G>filename.txt

will do it

Windows Shell Scripting and InstallShield

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#6 31 Mar 2012 03:01
md5


My bad! He was quite right. If I only want to echo one character with the command, and if "=" is the character, then it works just as he stated. Yet, my objective, which I admit was not perfectly clarified, is to "echo" several characters separately while using only one command. I was using this command for my testing: for %G in (a b c) do echo:%G, which works perfectly in "most" cases. This would be the result:

a
b
c

Apparrently, it has some limitations in regard to which characters it allows, and, indeed, I can use the command again modified to the way he suggested. However, I cannot do it like this: for %G in (a b = c) do echo:%G in order to get the result I was hoping for:

a
b
=
c

The alternate method does not work: for /f %G in ("a b = c") do echo:%G, and I do not see how to change the options for "/f" to make it work in this way. Thanks for the suggestion anyway. It does allow me to work around the issue if need be.

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#7 31 Mar 2012 03:35
RG


Could do it in a bat file like this... Does that help?

Code: Select all

@echo off
set filename=filename.txt
IF EXIST %filename% DEL /q %filename%
call :Echo1Char a b "=" c
goto :eof

:Echo1Char
for %%G in (%*) do echo.%%~G>>%filename%
goto :eof

If you need to do from CMD, then put this in Echo1Char.bat

Code: Select all

@echo off
for %%G in (%*) do echo.%%~G>>filename.txt
goto :eof

and then from the command line you do
Echo1Char.bat a b "=" c
remembering to delete filename.txt when you want to start clean

Last edited by RG (31 Mar 2012 03:38)

Windows Shell Scripting and InstallShield

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#8 31 Mar 2012 08:25
md5


Absolutely, that will work. Outstanding. It did not occur to me using that parameter extension in this case. But now that you have pointed me in the right direction, I found that this will work even a bit more efficiently, and in a batch or the command line:

for %G in (a b "=" c) do echo:%~G>>testing

Thanks again for the help.

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#9 15 Apr 2012 19:14
dbenham


The token delimiters in a FOR IN() clause are the same as the token delimeters on the command line: <space> <tab> , ; =

I will ignore the <tab> because it doesn't play nice with my current console configuration

Code: Select all

>for %A in (a b,c;d=e) do @echo %A
a
b
c
d
e

The delimiters cannot be escaped, but they can be captured by quotes, and the ~ modifier will strip the enclosing quotes

Code: Select all

>for %A in (" " "," ";" "=") do @echo [%~A]
[ ]
[,]
[;]
[=]

Dave Benham