6/23/2020 Loops in Batch Scripting Language

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Loops in Batch Scripting Language

View more Tutorials:

Batch Scripting Language Tutorials

1- Overview of loops in Batch language

2- For Loop (Default)
3- For /R
4- For /D
5- For /L
6- For /F

1- Overview of loops in Batch language

Standard Delimiters

Space
Comma ( , )
Semi-colon ( ; )
TAB

2- For Loop (Default)

For loop (default) of Batch language is used to iterate over a list of files.

Syntax:

?
1 @rem set_of_files -  Set of Files
2 @rem Files separated by standard delimiters.
3 @rem The parameter name 'variable' must be 1 character
4  
5 FOR %%variable IN ( set_of_files ) DO command
6  
7 @rem Hoặc:
8  
9 FOR %%parameter IN ( set_of_files ) DO  (
10  
11      command
12 )

Example: copy some files into a directory (Note: the files to be copied into the target directory need to be in the same disk drive).

copyFiles.bat

?
1 @echo off
2  
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3 @rem Copy to same Disk
4  
5 FOR %%f IN (E:\test\file1.data  E:\test\file2.txt) DO  (
6     
7    echo Copying %%f
8    copy  %%f E:\backup
9 )
10  
11  
12 pause

Other example:

?
1 @rem The delimiter is a semicolon (;)
2 FOR %%f IN ("E:\my dir\file1.data" ; E:\test\file2.txt) DO copy %%f E:\backup
3  
4 @rem The delimiter is a comma ( , )
5 FOR %%f IN ("E:\my dir\file1.data" , E:\test\file2.txt) DO copy %%f E:\backup
6  
7 @rem The delimiter is a space.
8 FOR %%f IN ("E:\my dir\file1.data" E:\test\file2.txt) DO copy %%f E:\backup

3- For /R
The   FOR /R loop is used to iterate over the list of files, including files in subdirectories, grandchildren .. It is called Recurse loop.

Syntax:

?
1 FOR /R [path] %%variable IN ( set_of_file_filters ) DO command
2  
3 @rem Or:
4  
5 FOR /R [path] %%variable IN ( set_of_file_filters ) DO (
6  
7    command
8 )

[path] : This parameter is a root folder. If there is not this parameter  "the folder containing executable script file" hoặc
"current folder" will be considered as root folder .
set_of_file_filters : List of file filters, for example *.txt , *.bat, ... or dot ( . ) means all.
variable: means name of variable and must have one unique characte.

The following example prints the list of all *.txt  or  *.log  files in the C:/Windows/System32  directory  (Includes search in
subdirectories, grandchildren ..)

forR_example1.bat

?
1 @echo off
2  
3 FOR /R "C:\Windows\System32" %%f IN (*.txt *.log) DO  (
4     

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5    echo %%f
6 )
7  
8 pause
9

Example of listing all files in the  C:/Windows/System32 directory (including files in subdirectories, grandchildren ...)

forR_example2.bat

?
1 @echo off
2  
3  
4 FOR /R "C:\Windows\System32" %%f IN ( . ) DO  (
5     
6    echo %%f
7 )
8  
9 pause

4- For /D
The  FOR /D loop is used to iterate over the list of directories which are subdirectories of current directory.

Syntax:

?
1 FOR /D [/r] %%variable IN ( set_of_directory_filters ) DO command
2  
3 @rem Or:
4  
5 FOR /D [/r] %%parameter IN ( set_of_directory_filters ) DO  (
6  
7     command
8 )

set_of_directory_filters : List of directory filters for example,  en*, fr*,..  separated by a standard delimiter.
[/r]: This is a recurse parameter and not mandatory. If this parameter is available,  subdirectories, grandchildren .. will be
envolved in the loop. 
variable: means name of variable and must have a unique character.

Example: List subdirectories of  C:/Windows.

forD_example1.bat

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?
1 @echo off
2  
3 C:
4 cd C:/Windows
5  
6 FOR /D %%d IN ( * ) DO  (
7     
8    echo %%d
9 )
10  
11 pause

Example: List subdirectories,  grandchildren ... of the  C:/Windows with the name started by "en" or  "fr"

forD_example2.bat

?
1 @echo off
2  
3 C:
4 cd C:/Windows
5  
6 FOR /D /r %%d IN (en* fr*) DO  (
7    
8    echo %%d
9 )
10  
11 pause

5- For /L
For /R loop is used to iterate over a range of numbers.

Syntax:

?
1 FOR /L %%variable IN (start, step, end) DO command
2  
3 @rem Or:
4  
5 FOR /L %%variable IN (start, step, end) DO  (
6  
7      command
8 )

start: The first value of variable

step: After each iteration, variable value will be added 'step'.
end: Last value.

Example:

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forL_example1.bat

?
1 @echo off
2  
3  
4 FOR /L %%d IN (1 2 8 ) DO  (
5     
6    echo %%d
7 )
8  
9 pause

forL_example2.bat

?
1 @echo off
2  
3  
4 FOR /L %%d IN (20 -2 5 ) DO  (
5     
6    echo %%d
7 )
8  
9 pause
10

6- For /F
The  For /F loop is a complex but powerful loop. It reads a file or a few files and then analyzes the contents of files. The content of
a file is a text; it is split into several small pieces of text, each of which is called a Token. The default rule for separating a text is
based on white space. However, you can customize the delimiter rule by ["delims = xxx"] parameter.

The For / F loop is also used to analyze the contents of a string, or to execute a set of commands.

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Syntax:

?
1 FOR /F ["options"] %%variable IN ( set_of_filenames ) DO command
2  
3 FOR /F ["options"] %%variable IN ( set_of_filenames ) DO (
4  
5      command
6 )
7        
8      
9 FOR /F ["options"] %%variable IN ("Text string to process") DO command
10  
11 FOR /F ["options"] %%variable IN ("Text string to process") DO (
12  
13      command
14 )

set_of_filenames: List of a or several files.

options: Options, for example, "delims=, tokens=1,2,4"

Option Description

delims=xxx Delimiter character(s). by default is a space

skip=n The first line number will be ignored in the contents of  file, defaulted skip = 0

eol (End of Line): Specifies a special character, which is put at the beginning of a line to mark this line as
eol=;
comment line. Comment lines will be ignored by the program, defaulted semicolon character (;)

tokens=n1,n2,n3 defines the positions cared about (n1, n2, n3, ..), defaulted tokens=1
usebackq (See explanation in examples)

To be easy to understand, let's analyze the following file:

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eol (End of Line)

eol: Used to specify a special character, which is by default a semicolon character (;). It is placed at the beginning of a line to mark
that such line is a comment. The program will ignore this line.

skip=n

skip: Declare the number of first lines of the file will be ignored, the program will not analyze these lines. Default skip = 0

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delims (Delimiter character(s))

delims: Defines delimiter characters, helping the program to delimit each line of text into sub-paragraphs, each of which is called a
Token. Tokens are marked indices: 1, 2, 3, ...

tokens=n1,n2,n3

tokens: Declare a list of  indices that are interested in, separated by commas. For example, tokens = 1,2,4, defaulted: tokens = 1

Tokens Description
tokens=1,2,4 The indices such as 1, 2, 4 are interested.
tokens=2-8 The indices of  2 to 8 are interested

tokens=3,* The indices such as 3, 4,5, ... are interested

tokens=* All indices are interested 

For example,   "tokens=1,2,4", means that  Tokens at the position of 1, 2, 4 are interested and other Tokens will be ignored.

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Example of file analysis:

Example of using the  FOR /F loop to read persons.txt file:

persons.txt

?
1 List of celebrities
2 Creation date: 2017/09/11
3  
4 ; (Comment) Male List
5 Bill,Gates,1955/10/28,Male
6 Steve,Jobs,1955/02/24,Male
7 Mark,Zuckerberg,1984/05/16,Male
8 Sundar,Pichai,1972/07/12,Male
9 ; (Comment) Female List
10 Hillary,Clinton,1947/10/26,Female

forF_example1.bat

?
1 @echo off
2  
3  
4 FOR /F "delims=, skip=3 eol=; tokens=1,2,4" %%i IN ( persons.txt ) DO  (
5     
6    echo Full Name: %%i %%j   Gender: %%k
7     
8 )
9  
10 pause
11
12

“ Note: Name of variables on the loop has only character .

Biến %%i variable is explicitly declared on the loop.   %% j, %% k variables are implicitly declared (names of implicit
variables are the next characters of  explicit variable names).

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Example of chain analysis:

TODO

View more Tutorials:

Batch Scripting Language Tutorials

Batch Scripting Language Tutorials

Batch Scripting Language Tutorial for Beginners

Variables in Batch Scripting Language
Loops in Batch Scripting Language
Arrays in Batch Scripting Language

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