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It is the default behaviour: If you escape a character (using the circumflex-character '^'), or add characters when the interpreter expects text starting with escaped characters (using for-variables in the way you did), then it has no special function for the tokenizer that splits the command line ...

That's not "nothing" - it's a space-character. Since the space-character is no valid command, the error message is correct. Typically space characters are treated as whitespace characters and will not end up beeing treated as a command. But you can force cmd to treat the space-character as a comman...

This works as expected: for /f "tokens=1,* delims=," %b in ("call,dir") do %~b %~c Results: C:\Users\xxx>call dir Volume in drive C is System Volume Serial Number is 00E1-E8B3 Directory of... (dir listing) However, the following gives an error: for /f "tokens=1,* delims=," %b in (" ,dir") do %~b %~c...

Where an extra level of expansion is required, it is generally simpler to use call or a for loop to expand component delayed variables of macros. A short example of using call to trigger an extra parsing step for the sort of use case you propose: @Echo off For /f delims^= %%e in ('echo Prompt $E^|c...

Note: the double colon : character also interferes with expanding variables recursively the way the function does. So i recommended to replace them too in strings with for instance #dc# en substitute them with double colons in the return value when needed literally. To explain why I don't just simpl...

This would do the trick: @echo off pause for %%b in ("C:\Program Files (x86)\Symantec\Symantec Endpoint Protection") do ( start "Contents of Symantec Endpoint Protection" /wait "cmd" "/d /k dir /p /on "%%~sfb" & pause & exit ) pause exit /b Hang on, never mind, didn't read the post itself well and t...

Havn't found any solutions yet, so i recommended doing the same with ^ caret characters as with ! exclamation mark characters as i explained above. In the example below i replace #ct# with ^ in the returned result. Example: @echo off REM Code to test recursively expand variables in strings: set "tes...

Found a workaround at least for the mentioned issue about literally meant special characters ! and %. The updated function currently replaces #pc# with % percent sign characters. Function: :Expand Text [Rtn] :: @param (str) Text text with variables to expand :: @param (str) Rtn return variable :: @r...

Hello everyone, I wanted to share a function i just made to recursively expand variables in strings. I've searched for it here and havn't come accross it on the forum so i thought to post it here. It works for me for most and simple cases, i hope it may be of help to others. Function to recursively ...

Aahh thanks for the explanation clearing things up! :) I will look into those topics you mentioned for further information. Very interested in the use-case you mentioned sst. True these are not really nested variables, wanted a simple example to reproduce the behavior I encountered. Thanks again a l...

If somehow cmd.exe can continue after ") is unexpected at this time" errors, then this behavior could be used and save a lot of code.

Even simpler code to reproduce it: @echo off REM Case study: "variable refences variable references variable..." set "test1=a value 123" set "test2=!test1! 456" set "test3=!test2! 789" set "test4=!test3! 10" set "test5=!test4! 11" set "test6=!test5! 12" set "test7=!test6! 13" set "test8=!test7! 14" ...

Smaller code sample to reproduce effect: @echo off REM Case study: "variable refences variables references variable..." set "test1=a value 123" set "test2=!test1! 456" set "test3=!test2! 789" set "test4=!test3! 10" set "test5=!test4! 11" set "test6=!test5! 12" set "test7=!test6! 13" set "test8=!test...

I wanted a routine for expanding nested variables no matter how many levels deep. I was fiddling with dynamically constructing FOR statements for each nested level to expand nested variables when i stumbled upon some interesting behavior, and an error but that was expected and easily resolved. Below...

I'd suggest to keep your original post original and place updates in a reply/comment. Otherwise, people might get confused about the article. Just a friendly tip :wink: Based on your current update of this article, I've created and tested some code. Below I've adjusted your code a bit to make it wor...