Pass path with spaces as parameter to bat file

Question

I have a simple bat script that copies files from an known directory to a directory given by the user  How can I pass the path  it might contain spaces  to my script and use it with the xcopy command     In my code i have the following   READ PWA PATH     if   1                   rem Set default path         set PWA PATH  C  Program Files PWA          rem         echo You have not specified your PWA url          echo Default will be assumed  C  Program Files PWA           choice  C YN  M  Do you wish to continue  Y  or cancel the script  N                IF ERRORLEVEL   2 GOTO CANCEL             IF ERRORLEVEL   1 GOTO READ WSS SERVER EXTENSIONS PATH         GOTO END       else           set PWA PATH  1         If I simply call the script I get the following error   C  Projects Setup gt install cmd  C  program files  x86    ----------------- SETUP SCRIPT -----------------  files was unexpected at this time  C  Projects Setup gt

User · Answer

If you have a path with spaces you must surround it with quotation marks       Not sure if that s exactly what you re asking though

User · Answer

If you have a path with spaces you must surround it with quotation marks       Not sure if that s exactly what you re asking though

User · Answer

I think the OP s problem was that he wants to do BOTH of the following    Pass a parameter which may contain spaces Test whether the parameter is missing   As several posters have mentioned  to pass a parameter containing spaces  you must surround the actual parameter value with double quotes   To test whether a parameter is missing  the method I always learned was   if   1          However  if the actual parameter is quoted  as it must be if the value contains spaces   this becomes  if   actual parameter value           which causes the  unexpected  error   If you instead use  if  1         then the error no longer occurs for quoted values   But in that case  the test no longer works when the value is missing -- it becomes  if          To fix this  use any other characters  except ones with special meaning to DOS  instead of quotes in the test   if   1        if   1        if abc 1xyz    abcxyz

User · Answer

echo off setlocal enableextensions enabledelayedexpansion  if  1                    rem Set default path         set PWA PATH  C  Program Files PWA          rem         echo You have not specified your PWA url          echo Default will be assumed  C  Program Files PWA               choice  C YN  M  Do you wish to continue  Y  or cancel the script  N                    IF ERRORLEVEL   2 GOTO CANCEL                 IF ERRORLEVEL   1 GOTO READ WSS SERVER EXTENSIONS PATH         GOTO END       else           set PWA PATH  1          echo  PWA PATH  vs   1         goto end        READ WSS SERVER EXTENSIONS PATH echo ok goto end  CANCEL echo cancelled  end echo  final  PWA PATH  vs   1   As VardhanDotNet mentions   1 is enough       1   would add quotes around quotes    c  Program Files xxx   which means     empty string         followed by  c  Program    followed by the  unexpected here   Files xxx    followed by an empty string        Note however that if you need to use PWA PATH within your IF clause  you need to refer if as  PWA PATH   hence the enabledelayedexpansion as the beginning of the script

User · Answer

echo off setlocal enableextensions enabledelayedexpansion  if  1                    rem Set default path         set PWA PATH  C  Program Files PWA          rem         echo You have not specified your PWA url          echo Default will be assumed  C  Program Files PWA               choice  C YN  M  Do you wish to continue  Y  or cancel the script  N                    IF ERRORLEVEL   2 GOTO CANCEL                 IF ERRORLEVEL   1 GOTO READ WSS SERVER EXTENSIONS PATH         GOTO END       else           set PWA PATH  1          echo  PWA PATH  vs   1         goto end        READ WSS SERVER EXTENSIONS PATH echo ok goto end  CANCEL echo cancelled  end echo  final  PWA PATH  vs   1   As VardhanDotNet mentions   1 is enough       1   would add quotes around quotes    c  Program Files xxx   which means     empty string         followed by  c  Program    followed by the  unexpected here   Files xxx    followed by an empty string        Note however that if you need to use PWA PATH within your IF clause  you need to refer if as  PWA PATH   hence the enabledelayedexpansion as the beginning of the script

User · Answer

1  will work most of the time  However there are a few things you need to note for this    It s not supported in Windows NT 4 0  You need Windows 2000 or later   If you are coding a script compatible with old OS  beware   It does not make parameters secure and sanitized  My observation is that there is no way to properly sanitize the command line arguments in CMD scripts    To demonstrate second point  let me give an example   REM example cmd ECHO   1   Run with example cmd dummy  amp DIR   The ampersand is escaped here     amp    to prevent shell from interpreting as a command delimiter  so that it becomes part of the argument passed to the script  The DIR is interpreted as a command inside the sub-shell running the script  where it shouldn t   Quoting it might work some time  but still insecure   REM example2 cmd SETLOCAL EnableExtensions EnableDelayedExpansion SET  arg1   1  ECHO    1  ECHO  arg1       example2 cmd foo    amp DIR  amp   bar will break it  DIR command will be run two times  one right after SET and the other right after the first ECHO  You see that the    1  you think is quoted well gets unquoted by the argument itself   So  no way to make parsing arguments secure    EDIT  EnableDelayedExpansion doesn t work in Windows NT 4 either  Thanks to the info here  http   www robvanderwoude com local php

User · Answer

Use    1     1 alone removes surrounding quotes  However since you can t know whether the input parameter  1 has quotes or not  you should ensure by    1  that they are added for sure  This is especially helpful when concatenating variables  e g  convert exe    1 input     1 output

User · Answer

If your path contains space then try using   s1  This will remove the space and appends  1 to your path and more importantly it refers to the absolute path of your file  Try using it

User · Answer

I think the OP s problem was that he wants to do BOTH of the following    Pass a parameter which may contain spaces Test whether the parameter is missing   As several posters have mentioned  to pass a parameter containing spaces  you must surround the actual parameter value with double quotes   To test whether a parameter is missing  the method I always learned was   if   1          However  if the actual parameter is quoted  as it must be if the value contains spaces   this becomes  if   actual parameter value           which causes the  unexpected  error   If you instead use  if  1         then the error no longer occurs for quoted values   But in that case  the test no longer works when the value is missing -- it becomes  if          To fix this  use any other characters  except ones with special meaning to DOS  instead of quotes in the test   if   1        if   1        if abc 1xyz    abcxyz

User · Answer

Interesting one  I love collecting quotes about quotes handling in cmd command   Your particular scripts gets fixed by using  1 instead of   1       By adding an  echo on    or getting rid of an echo off    you could have easily found  that out

User · Answer

Use    1     1 alone removes surrounding quotes  However since you can t know whether the input parameter  1 has quotes or not  you should ensure by    1  that they are added for sure  This is especially helpful when concatenating variables  e g  convert exe    1 input     1 output

User · Answer

Suppose you want to backup a database by executing a batch file from within a C  code  Here is a fully working solution that deals with blank spaces inside the path  This works in Windows  I have not tested it with mono though  C  code          public bool BackupDatabase                 bool res   true          string file    quot db bat quot           if   File Exists file   return false           BackupPaths ForEach path   gt                        Directory CreateDirectory path                string filePath   Path Combine path  string Format  quot  0   1  bak quot   Util ConvertDateTimeToFileName false   DatabaseName                Process process   new Process                process StartInfo FileName   file              process StartInfo Arguments   string Format  quot   0   1      quot  2     quot  quot                    DBServerName                   DatabaseName                   filePath                process StartInfo WindowStyle   ProcessWindowStyle Normal               try                               process Start                    process WaitForExit                              catch  Exception ee                                Logger Log ee                   res   false                                    return res         and here is the batch file   echo OFF set DB ServerName  1 set Name of Database  2 set PathToBackupLocation  3  echo Server Name     DB ServerName   echo Name of Database     Name of Database   echo Path To Backup Location     PathToBackupLocation    osql -S  DB ServerName  -E -Q  quot BACKUP DATABASE  Name of Database  TO DISK  PathToBackupLocation  quot

User · Answer

If you have a path with spaces you must surround it with quotation marks       Not sure if that s exactly what you re asking though

User · Answer

Interesting one  I love collecting quotes about quotes handling in cmd command   Your particular scripts gets fixed by using  1 instead of   1       By adding an  echo on    or getting rid of an echo off    you could have easily found  that out

User · Answer

Suppose you want to backup a database by executing a batch file from within a C  code  Here is a fully working solution that deals with blank spaces inside the path  This works in Windows  I have not tested it with mono though  C  code          public bool BackupDatabase                 bool res   true          string file    quot db bat quot           if   File Exists file   return false           BackupPaths ForEach path   gt                        Directory CreateDirectory path                string filePath   Path Combine path  string Format  quot  0   1  bak quot   Util ConvertDateTimeToFileName false   DatabaseName                Process process   new Process                process StartInfo FileName   file              process StartInfo Arguments   string Format  quot   0   1      quot  2     quot  quot                    DBServerName                   DatabaseName                   filePath                process StartInfo WindowStyle   ProcessWindowStyle Normal               try                               process Start                    process WaitForExit                              catch  Exception ee                                Logger Log ee                   res   false                                    return res         and here is the batch file   echo OFF set DB ServerName  1 set Name of Database  2 set PathToBackupLocation  3  echo Server Name     DB ServerName   echo Name of Database     Name of Database   echo Path To Backup Location     PathToBackupLocation    osql -S  DB ServerName  -E -Q  quot BACKUP DATABASE  Name of Database  TO DISK  PathToBackupLocation  quot

User · Answer

If your path contains space then try using   s1  This will remove the space and appends  1 to your path and more importantly it refers to the absolute path of your file  Try using it

User · Answer

echo off setlocal enableextensions enabledelayedexpansion  if  1                    rem Set default path         set PWA PATH  C  Program Files PWA          rem         echo You have not specified your PWA url          echo Default will be assumed  C  Program Files PWA               choice  C YN  M  Do you wish to continue  Y  or cancel the script  N                    IF ERRORLEVEL   2 GOTO CANCEL                 IF ERRORLEVEL   1 GOTO READ WSS SERVER EXTENSIONS PATH         GOTO END       else           set PWA PATH  1          echo  PWA PATH  vs   1         goto end        READ WSS SERVER EXTENSIONS PATH echo ok goto end  CANCEL echo cancelled  end echo  final  PWA PATH  vs   1   As VardhanDotNet mentions   1 is enough       1   would add quotes around quotes    c  Program Files xxx   which means     empty string         followed by  c  Program    followed by the  unexpected here   Files xxx    followed by an empty string        Note however that if you need to use PWA PATH within your IF clause  you need to refer if as  PWA PATH   hence the enabledelayedexpansion as the beginning of the script

User · Answer

If you have a path with spaces you must surround it with quotation marks       Not sure if that s exactly what you re asking though

User · Answer

Interesting one  I love collecting quotes about quotes handling in cmd command   Your particular scripts gets fixed by using  1 instead of   1       By adding an  echo on    or getting rid of an echo off    you could have easily found  that out

User · Answer

1  will work most of the time  However there are a few things you need to note for this    It s not supported in Windows NT 4 0  You need Windows 2000 or later   If you are coding a script compatible with old OS  beware   It does not make parameters secure and sanitized  My observation is that there is no way to properly sanitize the command line arguments in CMD scripts    To demonstrate second point  let me give an example   REM example cmd ECHO   1   Run with example cmd dummy  amp DIR   The ampersand is escaped here     amp    to prevent shell from interpreting as a command delimiter  so that it becomes part of the argument passed to the script  The DIR is interpreted as a command inside the sub-shell running the script  where it shouldn t   Quoting it might work some time  but still insecure   REM example2 cmd SETLOCAL EnableExtensions EnableDelayedExpansion SET  arg1   1  ECHO    1  ECHO  arg1       example2 cmd foo    amp DIR  amp   bar will break it  DIR command will be run two times  one right after SET and the other right after the first ECHO  You see that the    1  you think is quoted well gets unquoted by the argument itself   So  no way to make parsing arguments secure    EDIT  EnableDelayedExpansion doesn t work in Windows NT 4 either  Thanks to the info here  http   www robvanderwoude com local php

User · Answer

echo off setlocal enableextensions enabledelayedexpansion  if  1                    rem Set default path         set PWA PATH  C  Program Files PWA          rem         echo You have not specified your PWA url          echo Default will be assumed  C  Program Files PWA               choice  C YN  M  Do you wish to continue  Y  or cancel the script  N                    IF ERRORLEVEL   2 GOTO CANCEL                 IF ERRORLEVEL   1 GOTO READ WSS SERVER EXTENSIONS PATH         GOTO END       else           set PWA PATH  1          echo  PWA PATH  vs   1         goto end        READ WSS SERVER EXTENSIONS PATH echo ok goto end  CANCEL echo cancelled  end echo  final  PWA PATH  vs   1   As VardhanDotNet mentions   1 is enough       1   would add quotes around quotes    c  Program Files xxx   which means     empty string         followed by  c  Program    followed by the  unexpected here   Files xxx    followed by an empty string        Note however that if you need to use PWA PATH within your IF clause  you need to refer if as  PWA PATH   hence the enabledelayedexpansion as the beginning of the script

User · Answer

Interesting one  I love collecting quotes about quotes handling in cmd command   Your particular scripts gets fixed by using  1 instead of   1       By adding an  echo on    or getting rid of an echo off    you could have easily found  that out

[command] Pass path with spaces as parameter to bat file

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