I am writing a batch file to create some secondary files but the ampersand (&) symbol is giving me some problems in the following line, echo MbeSetAppVariable "", "msToolSettings.placeText.type", 1& >>txt_ROAD_ORIGIN.bas is there any way to get the above line to work and also keep the ampersand (&) symbol in the results. The following line works fine because the ampersand (&)has been removed from the line. echo MbeSetAppVariable "", "msToolSettings.placeText.type", 1 >>txt_ROAD_ORIGIN.bas Thank you in advance for any assistance with this problem. Thank you in advance for any assistance with this problem. Ben

Hi Benton, Yeah, problem is that & has special meaning in NT CMD. This "works" but you get the double quotes in the BAS: C:\temp\-\amp>echo "MbeSetAppVariable "", "msToolSettings.placeText.type", 1 &" >>txt_ROAD_ORIGIN.bas I wondered if this could be gotten around by starting a COMMAND shell where, I'd think, & has no special meaning. Still got the error. M2 If at first you don't succeed, you're about average.

I think this will need to be worked around. You could use: Change And in your echo line use a string like ###, then: change txt_ROAD_ORIGIN.bas "###" "&" M2 If at first you don't succeed, you're about average.

I tried your suggestion by creating a line like this; echo MbeSetAppVariable "", "msToolSettings.placeText.type", 0### >>txt_ROAD_ORIGIN.bas and then created another batch file with the following in it; change txt_ROAD_ORIGIN.bas "###" "&" I placed the change.com file in the same folder. It didnt produce any results is there something that I have done wrong. Thank You Ben

Usually when CHANGE runs [actually always] it will give a result of either "changed" or "not changed". "It didnt produce any results" Well, either it did the change or it did not. You can test this with a trivial testfile: ::==================== @echo off echo one > testfile change testfile "one" "two" echo. type testfile ::===================== M2 If at first you don't succeed, you're about average.