I have a text file that will be created each morning by a 3rd party vendor. Well, their naming convention is as follows: Report_000.txt, Report_001.txt, etc. I would like to locate the date within the report and append it to the name of the file so it reads as: Report_06-17-09. The date is located on the second line (left justified) of the txt file in the following format: HDS9R1C06/17/09.

Hi Hartlar This Help Hi The "/" would be an illegal character in a filename so I have changed them to "-" The code below assumes you don't have the charactor in other filenames @echo off SetLocal EnableDelayedExpansion rem Find Report file that doe'nt contain "-" rem and set var File to it. dir /b | find "Report_" > ~Dir.txt type ~Dir.txt | find /v "-" >~File.txt set /p File=<~File.txt echo [%File%] set x=0 for /f "tokens=* delims=" %%a in ('type "%File%"') do ( set /a x+=1 set Line2=%%a if !x!==2 (set FileDate=!Line2:~-8!) ) rem Change "/" char to "-" set FileDate=%FileDate:/=-% ren %File% Report_%FileDate%.txt del ~Dir.txt del ~File.txt

if you can use gawk for windows (see my sig) BEGIN{ temp=0 # this part finds the greatest number in the filename, ie latest file. for(i=1;i<=ARGC;i++){ file=ARGV[i] gsub(/Report_|\.txt/,"",file) if(file>temp){ temp=file f[temp]=ARGV[i] } } getline < f[temp] getline d < f[temp] #get second line gsub(/^.*[a-zA-Z]/,"",d) gsub(/\//,"-",d) filename = "Report_"d cmd = "rename "f[temp]" "filename".txt" print cmd #system(cmd) #uncomment to use } save the above as myscript.awk and on command line C:\test>gawk -f test.awk Report_*.txt NB: assumes that you don't clear away your previous reports. GNU win32 packages | Gawk

@dtech: >>dir /b | find "Report_" why not dir /b Report_* and any way not to create temp files like ~File.txt and ~Dir.txt ?? GNU win32 packages | Gawk

Hi Ghostdog You're right about dir /b Report_* and I don't like using Temp files either, they're messy. But I needed a File for the Set /p command for the For loop. Unless anybody knows a better way. I guess I wrote it quickly without thinking as really I only needed one Temp file. rem Find Report file that doe'nt contain "-" rem and set var File to it. dir /b Report_* | find /v "-" >~File.txt set /p File=<~File.txt echo [%File%]

First, I want to thank each of you for your response. Here is the code that I am working with. Obviously, your code... @echo off SetLocal EnableDelayedExpansion rem Find Report file that doesn't contain "-" and set var File to it. dir /b Report_* | find /v "-" >~File.txt set /p File=<~File.txt echo [%File%] set x=0 for /f "tokens=* delims=" %%a in ('type "%File%"') do ( set /a x+=1 set Line2=%%a if !x!==2 (set FileDate=!Line2:~-8!) ) rem Change "/" char to "-" set FileDate=%FileDate:/=-% ren %File% Report_%FileDate%.txt del ~File.txt When I rem del ~File.txt: ~File.txt is created with the report name that I want renamed in the body of the file. For instance, Report_000.txt is on the first line of ~File.txt. Nothing actually happens to the report that I want renamed: Report_000.txt. Does something else need to be changed in the code above? Thanks again!

Please disregard my post from earlier today. I made a small change and got the script to work but it places text from the middle of the file instead of the date... Any ideas? Thanks again for the help. FROM ren %File% Report_%FileDate%.txt TO ren "%File%" "Report_%FileDate%.txt"