How to force echo command to output a tab character in MS nmake makefile? Verbatim tabs inserted right into a string after echo command are removed by nmake and don't show up in the output file.
all :
@echo I WANT TO OUTPUT THE <TAB> CHARACTER HERE! > output.txt
You can use a variable with TAB char. Put this lines in your .bat file:
set tab=[stroke TAB char from your keyboard]
echo a%tab%b>yourfile.txt
Doing so, yourfile.txt will have text a[TAB]b
output.txt:
<<output.txt
I WANT TO OUTPUT THE <TAB> CHARACTER HERE!
<<KEEP
<TAB> represents a literal tab character here of course.
DOS and Windows have ugly text support in native batch files :).
Here is nice way to do your task:
Simple script:
'''
append_char.py - appends character with specified code to end of file
Usage: append_char.py filename charcode
'''
import os
import sys
filename = sys.argv[1]
assert os.path.exists(filename)
charcode = int(sys.argv[2])
assert 0 <= charcode <= 255
fh = open(filename, 'ab')
fh.seek(0, os.SEEK_END)
fh.write(chr(charcode))
fh.close()
using this script from batch file you can create any possible file in universe :)
I had the same need. I used the answer using the quotes around the character and just took it one step further.
{tab} means pressing the keyboard tab key in the text editor.
SET tab="{tab}"
SET tab=%tab:~1,1%
The second line extracts the middle character from the quoted string.
Now you can use the %tab% variable with ECHO and, I suspect, anywhere else it's needed.
ECHO %tab%This text is indented, preceded by a tab.
I suspect this technique could be used with other problem characters as well.
As a workaround, you can create a file containing the tab character, named input.txt (not using nmake), and then say:
all :
@copy /b input.txt output.txt
I assume you already have tried to put the tab inside quotes?
all:
@echo "<TAB>" > output.txt
