What is the DOS search pattern expression to find files named "Main" with any integer extension?

Question

I have a program that generated unknown numbers of files with integer extension as follows.

enter image description here

I want to append .eps to each. How to do this in a DOS batch file?

I cannot use the following because I don't know the search expression.

for %%x in (Main.<what>) do rename "%%x" "%%x.eps"

Note: Any files having the same name with non-integer extension must be left as is.

And when you say 'integer extensions', you mean 2- or 4-digit ones just as well as 3-digit ones (like on the picture), don't you? — Andriy M, Jul 29 '11 at 23:37
@Andriy: the extension length vary from 3-digit 000 to 5-digit 99999, but in my situation 3-digit is more than enough. — Second Person Shooter, Jul 29 '11 at 23:39
Ah, that's a pity they can be zero-padded. I'll have to think of something else then. — Andriy M, Jul 29 '11 at 23:43
Why not just count from 001 to 99999, check if the file is there and rename it? — Fozi, Jul 30 '11 at 00:37

score 3 · Accepted Answer · answered Jul 30 '11 at 03:08

3

setlocal EnableDelayedExpansion
for %%x in (Main.*) do (
    set ext=%%~Xx
    set /a num=!ext:~1!
    if !num! gtr 0 rename "%%x" "%%x.eps"
)

First SET get just the extension of file name, including the dot (with ~X). Second SET /A try to convert the extension (without the dot with :~1) to number. If it is really a number (greater than zero) do the rename.

answered Jul 30 '11 at 03:08

Aacini

65,180
12
72
108

There might be issues with numbers that start with 0s. In batch scripting, such numbers are considered to be in octal notation, and thus values like `083`, `097` would cause errors in the `SET /A` command. Same goes about values that start with decimal digits but also contain some letters. The command shell would attempt to treat such a value as hexadecimal, and if contained letters outside the range from `A` to `F` (case-insensitive), an error would occur. – Andriy M Aug 01 '11 at 19:49

score 1 · Answer 2 · 2011-07-30T01:05:48.087

1

This should loop through the directory. Here is the explanation on how it works:

tokens = 1-2 means we only care about the first and second part of the file name.

delims = . means to split the tokens on the . in the file name.

dir /b means to only list the files, don't show any of the . or .. that is normally shown in the dir command. You need to put the directory in there or run from the same file directory.

LSS a char will always return GREATER THAN, that's how this works. I picked 9999, you can pick whatever.

Finally, it takes the first part of the file name (%%A) and then the extension (%%B) then renames to first part of the file name (%%A) with the eps extension.

for /f "tokens=1-2 delims=." %%A in ('dir /b') do if %%B LSS 9999 rename %%A.%%B %%A.%%B.eps

Put this in your batch file and run it.

Note: You can't rename to the same filename, so I used %%A.%%B.eps.

edited Jul 30 '11 at 01:05

answered Jul 30 '11 at 00:11

Assuming that works at all, how would it avoid renaming files with non-numeric extensions? – Carey Gregory Jul 30 '11 at 00:23
@Carey: The numerics have nothing to do with it. The extension is treated as a "token" because we specify the delimiter as the period, so it splits on the period. I just tried it here and it works. – Jul 30 '11 at 00:29
Add an IF expression for the second (%%B) token like in the answer above it think it will work - at least it will work little better than in my answer - it will still rename star.00XXX.star (((( – Boris Treukhov Jul 30 '11 at 00:34
The OP said "Note: Any files having the same name with non-integer extension must be left as is." – Carey Gregory Jul 30 '11 at 00:36
1

@Carey: Fixed. Added IF statement. – Jul 30 '11 at 00:54

What is the DOS search pattern expression to find files named "Main" with any integer extension?

2 Answers2