How to properly pass parameters to START?

Question

I just want to start a curl command in a minimized console.

this works:

START "" /B /W curl -X POST https://someurl.com -d "url_parameters_for_curl" > output.txt

But this does not work

START "" /MIN /W curl -X POST https://someurl.com -d "url_parameters_for_curl" > output.txt

I think it has something to do with the double quotes. I tried multiple escaping characters like ^ or "" and triple """ which worked for some other programs but START does not seem to be able to escape the double quotes when opening a new console window...

I've spent like 2 hours now trying to figure this out and I have no idea what to do.

PS: putting the command in a .bat file and calling it with

START /MIN /W mybat.bat

is working. But the command is generated on the fly and I don't want to write a file each time.

PPS: the command is spawned by a background process without a console window which leads to a console window popping up every time this happens. I just wanted it to appear minimized.

EDIT:

The hint with escaping the

> output.xml

with

^> output.xml  OR ^>output.xml

did not work. But curl has an option to write the output to a file. So this finally worked:

START "" /MIN /W curl -X POST https://someurl.com -d "url_parameters_for_curl" -o output.txt

The question remains: How would you escape the "> outputfile" using the START command?

What do you mean by "it doesn't work"? please be precise! the double-quotes shouldn't be a problem, maybe you even need more of them around the URL… — aschipfl
– aschipfl, Commented Dec 14, 2020 at 15:00
I agree: the quotes shouldn't be a problem. I guess your output.txt is empty? You redirect the output of the start command - which is empty. Escape the > to pass it to the started process: ...^>output.txt — Stephan
– Stephan, Commented Dec 14, 2020 at 15:04

Compo · Accepted Answer · 2020-12-14 15:14:16Z

1

I would say, because curl.exe is a CLI process, that it isn't cURL you need to minimize, but the cmd.exe window it spawns to run within.

For that reason, I'd offer:

Start /Min /W %SystemRoot%\System32\cmd.exe /D/Q/C "%SystemRoot%\System32\curl.exe -X POST https://someurl.com -d "url_parameters_for_curl" 1> "output.txt" 2>&1"

In the example above, I've also redirected StdErr to the file, (because you wouldn't see that, in a minimized window). If you don't want that, you can remove 2>&1 from above.

answered Dec 14, 2020 at 15:14

Compo

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