Windows batch script: how to write and run a .bat file

1. 1

   Step 1: Open Notepad

   Click Start, type Notepad and open it. Any plain text editor works; a word processor doesn't.

2. 2

   Step 2: Type the commands

   One command per line, for example:

   @echo off
   echo Hello from %COMPUTERNAME%
   ipconfig | findstr IPv4
   pause

3. 3

   Step 3: Save it as a .bat file

   Choose File, Save as, set Save as type to All files and name it something like hello.bat. Without All files, Notepad saves hello.bat.txt, which won't run.

4. 4

   Step 4: Run it

   Double-click the file, or open Command Prompt, go to its folder with cd and type its name. If a command needs administrator rights, right-click the file and choose Run as administrator.

.bat and .cmd behave the same for nearly every script; .cmd is the newer name. To run a script at a set time, add it to Task Scheduler (Start, type Task Scheduler, then Create Basic Task).

Any program you can run in Command Prompt works in a script too: robocopy, ipconfig, tasklist, taskkill, shutdown and the rest. Type a command followed by /? to see its options.

@echo off
:: Copy Documents to drive E, keeping a log
set SRC=%USERPROFILE%\Documents
set DST=E:\Backup\Documents
if not exist E:\ (
  echo The backup drive isn't plugged in.
  exit /b 1
)
robocopy "%SRC%" "%DST%" /E /R:1 /W:1 /LOG:"%DST%-log.txt"
if %ERRORLEVEL% GEQ 8 (echo Some files failed to copy.) else (echo Backup done.)

robocopy exit codes under 8 mean it worked, which is why the last line checks for 8 or more. Quotes around the paths keep folder names with spaces working.

On your own network, PowerShell can run a script on other PCs; see remote PowerShell. For PCs anywhere, RemoteAccessApp runs commands without a remote session:

• On the Devices page, select one PC or several, right-click and choose Run a command.
• Pick Command Prompt and paste the script's lines. They're typed into Command Prompt one by one, as if from the keyboard, so write %f rather than %%f in a for loop and leave out exit.
• For a longer script, send the .bat file to the PCs first (Send to several PCs on the File transfer page), then run it by its full path.
• It runs on every selected PC at once, as the person signed in there, and each PC shows its output and exit code.
• Unless unattended access lets you in, the person at each PC sees the exact commands and chooses whether they run.

Run a command without a remote session has the steps, and run a script on multiple PCs covers saved scripts and schedules, which are part of Pro.