Is there a dev null on Windows

Question

What is the equivalent of  dev null on Windows

User · Accepted Answer

I think you want NUL  at least within a command prompt or batch files   For example   type c  autoexec bat  gt  NUL   doesn t create a file    I believe the same is true if you try to create a file programmatically  but I haven t tried it    In PowerShell  you want  null   echo 1  gt   null

User · Answer

You have to use start and  NUL for this in Windows PowerShell   Type in this command assuming mySum is the name of your application and 5 10 are command line arguments you are sending   start   mySum  5 10  gt   NUL 2 gt  amp 1   The start command will start a detached process  a similar effect to  amp   The  B option prevents start from opening a new terminal window if the program you are running is a console application  and NUL is Windows  equivalent of  dev null  The 2 gt  amp 1 at the end will redirect stderr to stdout  which will all go to NUL

User · Answer

According to this message on the GCC mailing list  you can use the file  nul  instead of  dev null    include  lt stdio h gt   int main          FILE  outfile   fopen    dev null    w        if  outfile    NULL                fputs   could not open   dev null    stderr             outfile   fopen   nul    w        if  outfile    NULL                fputs   could not open  nul    stderr              return 0       Credits to Danny for this code  copy-pasted from his message    You can also use this special  nul  file through redirection

User · Answer

Jon Skeet is correct   Here is the Nul Device Driver page in the Windows Embedded documentation  I have no idea why it s not somewhere else       Here is another    The null device in the registry Special file names More on file naming

User · Answer

According to this message on the GCC mailing list  you can use the file  nul  instead of  dev null    include  lt stdio h gt   int main          FILE  outfile   fopen    dev null    w        if  outfile    NULL                fputs   could not open   dev null    stderr             outfile   fopen   nul    w        if  outfile    NULL                fputs   could not open  nul    stderr              return 0       Credits to Danny for this code  copy-pasted from his message    You can also use this special  nul  file through redirection

User · Answer

You have to use start and  NUL for this in Windows PowerShell   Type in this command assuming mySum is the name of your application and 5 10 are command line arguments you are sending   start   mySum  5 10  gt   NUL 2 gt  amp 1   The start command will start a detached process  a similar effect to  amp   The  B option prevents start from opening a new terminal window if the program you are running is a console application  and NUL is Windows  equivalent of  dev null  The 2 gt  amp 1 at the end will redirect stderr to stdout  which will all go to NUL

User · Answer

NUL in Windows seems to be actually a virtual path in any folder  Just like       in any filesystem   Use any folder followed with NUL will work   Example   echo 1  gt  nul echo 1  gt  c  nul echo 1  gt  c  users nul echo 1  gt  c  windows nul   have the same effect as  dev null on Linux   This was tested on Windows nbsp 7  64 bit

User · Answer

Jon Skeet is correct   Here is the Nul Device Driver page in the Windows Embedded documentation  I have no idea why it s not somewhere else       Here is another    The null device in the registry Special file names More on file naming

User · Answer

According to this message on the GCC mailing list  you can use the file  nul  instead of  dev null    include  lt stdio h gt   int main          FILE  outfile   fopen    dev null    w        if  outfile    NULL                fputs   could not open   dev null    stderr             outfile   fopen   nul    w        if  outfile    NULL                fputs   could not open  nul    stderr              return 0       Credits to Danny for this code  copy-pasted from his message    You can also use this special  nul  file through redirection

User · Answer

If you need to perform in Microsoft Windows the equivalent of a symlink to  dev null in Linux you would open and administrator s cmd and type   For files   mklink c  path to file ext NUL    Or  for directories   mklink  D c  path to dir NUL    This will keep the file direcotry always at 0 byte  and still return success to every write attempt

User · Answer

NUL in Windows seems to be actually a virtual path in any folder  Just like       in any filesystem   Use any folder followed with NUL will work   Example   echo 1  gt  nul echo 1  gt  c  nul echo 1  gt  c  users nul echo 1  gt  c  windows nul   have the same effect as  dev null on Linux   This was tested on Windows nbsp 7  64 bit

User · Answer

NUL works programmatically as well  E g  the following  freopen  quot NUL quot    quot w quot   stderr    works as expected without creating a file   MSVC   12 0

User · Answer

According to this message on the GCC mailing list  you can use the file  nul  instead of  dev null    include  lt stdio h gt   int main          FILE  outfile   fopen    dev null    w        if  outfile    NULL                fputs   could not open   dev null    stderr             outfile   fopen   nul    w        if  outfile    NULL                fputs   could not open  nul    stderr              return 0       Credits to Danny for this code  copy-pasted from his message    You can also use this special  nul  file through redirection

User · Answer

NUL works programmatically as well  E g  the following  freopen  quot NUL quot    quot w quot   stderr    works as expected without creating a file   MSVC   12 0

User · Answer

Jon Skeet is correct   Here is the Nul Device Driver page in the Windows Embedded documentation  I have no idea why it s not somewhere else       Here is another    The null device in the registry Special file names More on file naming

User · Answer

Jon Skeet is correct   Here is the Nul Device Driver page in the Windows Embedded documentation  I have no idea why it s not somewhere else       Here is another    The null device in the registry Special file names More on file naming

User · Answer

If you need to perform in Microsoft Windows the equivalent of a symlink to  dev null in Linux you would open and administrator s cmd and type   For files   mklink c  path to file ext NUL    Or  for directories   mklink  D c  path to dir NUL    This will keep the file direcotry always at 0 byte  and still return success to every write attempt

[windows] Is there a /dev/null on Windows?

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