batch file: remove file name in path in a string

Question

I have created a small batch file for windows, and I am having a small issue:

I defined a variable which contains a string, the path of a source file:

D:\git_repos\ALM_Sandboxs\Sensor_Config\StateManagement\ssm_state.cpp

I ´d like to extract the path without the file name:

D:\git_repos\ALM_Sandboxs\Sensor_Config\StateManagement\

Since the path can change, and so does the file name, I am having difficulties to do this. There are many ways, but I wasn´t able to use any of them:

The first one would be to count charaters of the file name:

set NumberOfCharacter

and do

set FilePath=%FilePathTemp2:~,%NumberOfCharacter%%

But this doesn´t work. I can only use number with this syntax: set FilePath=%FilePathTemp2:~,-18% ==> This works, but I´d like to read 18 from a variable

I have read that the batch interpreter can´t resolve the % pairs, so I tried

for /l %%x in (1,1,%strlength%) do set %FilePathTemp2%=%FilePathTemp2:~,-1%

It doesn´t work either, because the for loop seems not able to change FilePathTemp2 with a global scope.

I would be thankfull for any help

Stephan · Accepted Answer · 2019-01-07 14:56:50Z

2

for %%a in (D:\git_repos\ALM_Sandboxs\Sensor_Config\StateManagement\ssm_state.cpp) do echo %%~dpa

(this is batch file syntax. To use it directly on command line, replace both %% with a single %)

The usage of modifiers (like %%~dpa) and which modifiers are possible is explained in for /?

answered Jan 7, 2019 at 14:56

Stephan

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2 Comments

SebastienL Over a year ago

Hello Stephan, Thanks for the help! It worked, here is what I am using:

:: remove file name from path (only folders), and go to path<br/>   	for %%a in (%FilePathTemp2%) do set FilePath=%%~dpa   	cd %FilePath%

user7818749 Over a year ago

@SebastienL You could simply get away without having to set the variable then cd to it. For instance, simply replace echo in Stepan's answer with cd So you will have for %%a in (D:\git_repos\ALM_Sandboxs\Sensor_Config\StateManagement\ssm_state.cpp) do cd %%~dpa you could also use pushd especially if you are changing dir to another drive. see pushd /? from cmdline for more.

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