[windows] Batch files: List all files in a directory with relative paths

Concerning Windows batch files: Is there a way to list all the files (or all of a specific type) in a certain directory and its subdirectories, including the paths relative to the current (or the search) directory in the list?

For example, if I want all the .txt files in the current directory and subdirectories with their full paths, I can do

for /r . %%g in (*.txt) do echo %%g >> C:\temp\test.txt

or

dir *.txt /b /s >> C:\temp\test.txt

and I will get something like

C:\test\Doc1.txt
C:\test\subdir\Doc2.txt
C:\test\subdir\Doc3.txt

If I do

for /r . %%g in (*.txt) do echo %%~nxg >> C:\temp\test.txt

I will get something like

Doc1.txt
Doc2.txt
Doc3.txt

But what I really want is:

Doc1.txt
subdir\Doc2.txt
subdir\Doc3.txt

Is it possible?

If my post is too confusing: I basically want List files recursively in Linux CLI with path relative to the current directory, but just for Windows.

This answer will not work correctly with root paths containing equal signs (=). (Thanks @dbenham for pointing that out.)

EDITED: Fixed the issue with paths containing !, again spotted by @dbenham (thanks!).

Alternatively to calculating the length and extracting substrings you could use a different approach:

• store the root path;

• clear the root path from the file paths.

Here's my attempt (which worked for me):

@ECHO OFF
SETLOCAL DisableDelayedExpansion
SET "r=%__CD__%"
FOR /R . %%F IN (*) DO (
  SET "p=%%F"
  SETLOCAL EnableDelayedExpansion
  ECHO(!p:%r%=!
  ENDLOCAL
)

The r variable is assigned with the current directory. Unless the current directory is the root directory of a disk drive, it will not end with \, which we amend by appending the character. (No longer the case, as the script now reads the __CD__ variable, whose value always ends with \ (thanks @jeb!), instead of CD.)

In the loop, we store the current file path into a variable. Then we output the variable, stripping the root path along the way.

The simplest (but not the fastest) way to iterate a directory tree and list relative file paths is to use FORFILES.

forfiles /s /m *.txt /c "cmd /c echo @relpath"

The relative paths will be quoted with a leading .\ as in

".\Doc1.txt"
".\subdir\Doc2.txt"
".\subdir\Doc3.txt"

To remove quotes:

for /f %%A in ('forfiles /s /m *.txt /c "cmd /c echo @relpath"') do echo %%~A

To remove quotes and the leading .\:

setlocal disableDelayedExpansion
for /f "delims=" %%A in ('forfiles /s /m *.txt /c "cmd /c echo @relpath"') do (
  set "file=%%~A"
  setlocal enableDelayedExpansion
  echo !file:~2!
  endlocal
)

or without using delayed expansion

for /f "tokens=1* delims=\" %%A in (
  'forfiles /s /m *.txt /c "cmd /c echo @relpath"'
) do for %%F in (^"%%B) do echo %%~F

Of course, you may write a recursive algorithm in Batch that gives you exact control of what you do in every nested subdirectory:

@echo off
set mypath=
call :treeProcess
goto :eof

:treeProcess
setlocal
for %%f in (*.txt) do echo %mypath%%%f
for /D %%d in (*) do (
    set mypath=%mypath%%%d\
    cd %%d
    call :treeProcess
    cd ..
)
endlocal
exit /b

@echo on>out.txt
@echo off
setlocal enabledelayedexpansion
set "parentfolder=%CD%"
for /r . %%g in (*.*) do (
  set "var=%%g"
  set var=!var:%parentfolder%=!
  echo !var! >> out.txt
)