pretty much finished getting my little app to run and have a question about the system() command. i'm using a command line app called nconvert to process photos. i use a command similar to this from the command line: [code] nconvert -out outformat -o name_of_processed_file name_of_original_photo [/code] there are three variables i use in the command line scripting i have: outformat name_of_processed_file name_of_original_photo i tried this to get system() to execute nconvert but had a problem with the variables: [code] system("nconvert -o outformat -o name_of_processed_file name_of_original_photo") [/code] i assume the quotation marks around the nconvert command are the source of the problem. how do i use system() with variables for the parameters of the command line app? thanks, BabaG

got a reply elsewhere suggesting making a big string and using that within the system() command. just tried it and got an error. i declared: [code] string nconvert_param = "nconvert -out " + outformat + " -o " + name_of_processed_file + " " + name_of_original_photo [/code] which i can cout to the screen and prints just as it should. compiling, however, gives an error about not being able to convert 'std::string' to 'const char*' for the line in my code: [code] system( nconvert_param ); [/code] tried declaring string nconvert_param' as 'const char nconvert_param' but that produced a different error. what did i get wrong here? thanks again, BabaG

what did i get wrong here? Make it a string, then say system(nconvert_param.c_str());

thanks Razor2.3!