xcopy batch issue

Question

I want to copy a set of subfolders where name contains items on a list. The list has a set of codes (e.g. ABC1, ABC2) but the folders are named ABC1_revised_2018, etc. My batch file I put together is below. What I am getting a '"Usebackq tokens=^" was unexpected' error.

@ECHO ON
SET FileList=C:\filelist.txt
SET Source=C:\Files
SET Destination=C:\Files-Parsed
FOR /D "USEBACKQ TOKENS=^" %%D IN ("%FileList%") DO XCOPY /E /F /D "%Source%\%%~D" "%Destination%\"
GOTO :EOF

I am attempting to use ^ to denote match beginning of string but that clearly isn't working. Any ideas? I have tried with a batch file and also line by line in cmd.

append

Folder
     -ABC1-text-date (this is a subfolder)
     -ABC2-text-date

filelist.txt only has values like ABC1, ABC2, etc. not exact matches does this help?

Did you meand `for /F …..` **also without the `^` from `TOKENS=^`**? — double-beep, Feb 21 '19 at 16:30
@Tiw `tokens` may only be a number. That was not the actual error. — double-beep, Feb 21 '19 at 16:31
@Tiw he probably **meant** `delims`, so you are right if so. — double-beep, Feb 21 '19 at 16:32
Sorry! They're subfolders in a dfs, edited to reflect that, hence the /d rather than /f. Including ^ because each folder name begins with a value from that list, but it's not an exact match. — sibelius3, Feb 21 '19 at 16:57
Hi @Tiw, question appended with an example/explanation. Does that help? — sibelius3, Feb 21 '19 at 17:00
Not sure how you know about all the `FOR` options but don't know that you can't mix them together. — Squashman, Feb 21 '19 at 17:22
So you just want to xcopy matching directories inside the file? — Gerhard, Feb 21 '19 at 17:38
@GerhardBarnard yes, but the issue being the folder names are not exact matches — sibelius3, Feb 21 '19 at 17:41
@sibelius3, you are using [FOR /D](https://ss64.com/nt/for_d.html) — Squashman, Feb 21 '19 at 18:29

Gerhard · Answer 1 · 2019-02-22T06:29:09.637

1

Well, if you want to recurse through directories and copy sub directories as per partial matches inside the file:

@echo off
set "FileList=C:\filelist.txt"
set "Source=C:\Files"
set "Destination=C:\Files-Parsed"
for /f "delims=" %%a in (%filelist%) do (
  pushd %source%
  for /f "delims=" %%i in ('dir /s /b /ad "%%a*"') do xcopy /E /F /D "%%~fi" "%Destination%"
  popd
)

after getting the entry in the file, for /d will do a directory listing of the directory* in the source directory and physically copy the dir as C:\source\*\ABC2018 etc.

edited Feb 22 '19 at 06:29

answered Feb 21 '19 at 17:44

Gerhard

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thank you, this runs without errors, but doesn't seem to search subfolders. The subfolders I'm looking to copy would be found at c:\files\folder\abc1, etc. Would I need to adjust how I reference the source? – sibelius3 Feb 21 '19 at 21:00
@sibelius ok did not know that. Will update answer now. – Gerhard Feb 22 '19 at 06:09

xcopy batch issue

1 Answers1