BATCH FILE COMMANDS
Simple programming commands in a batch environment
Revised October 14, 2008
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Yeah, yeah, I know that many people think batch files are mostly things of the past. Sometimes, though, a well-conceived batch file is just the thing to automate the job you want to do.

I am not going to cover all the theory and practice of batch files from the ground up. Any good book on DOS (now found in the Antiquities section of your local library <g>), and many of the best on Windows, will have a section on batch files. Simply put, a batch file is a plaintext file with a name ending in .BAT. In its simplest form, it contains a series of commands that could be executed from a command prompt (system prompt). The batch file simply autoexecutes them for you. (In fact, AUTOEXEC.BAT is the best known, and most widely used, batch file.) To execute a batch file, type its name at a command prompt, or execute a Windows shortcut that does the same thing.

The simplest idea of how to write a batch file is: Figure out how you would type the commands at a DOS prompt, then type them, one per line, in a text file — and you’ve written your batch file.

However, there are also more sophisticated batch file structures, using simple programming commands built into the batch structure. This article summarizes the most important of these.