I would like to copy files from multiple sub directories to one folder so I used; FOR /R "%1" %%G IN (*.JPG) DO COPY %%G C:\TEST\ However, if files of the same name exist they are overwritten. How can I increment the filename or change the filename to something random as it isn't important? I have tried multiple ways using the time as a random number generator but failed. SET RANDOM=="%TIME:~0,2%%TIME:~3,2%%TIME:~6,2%%TIME:~9,2%" Please Help!

Oops, forget to mention this is a batch file under NT. Cheers!

First, NT has a %random% built in. For this purpose, incrementing wil work OK. ::== incNAME @echo off setLocal EnableDelayedExpansion for /f "tokens=* delims= " %%a in ('dir/s/b/a-d \files\*.txt') do ( set /a N+=1 echo ren "%%a" "!N!%%~Na.txt" ) ===================================== If at first you don't succeed, you're about average. M2

well... almost ::== @echo off setLocal EnableDelayedExpansion for /f "tokens=* delims= " %%a in ('dir/s/b/a-d \files\*.txt') do ( set /a N+=1 echo copy "%%a" "c:\test\!N!%%~Na.txt" ) ===================================== If at first you don't succeed, you're about average. M2

I can't seem to get this to work.. It's performing the command on each file but I don't understand your method of incrementation to fix this? set /a N+=1 echo copy "U:\Visio Drawings\cisco6509.JPG" "c:\test\!N!cisco6509.jpg" Missing operator.

this: set /a N+=1 echo copy "U:\Visio Drawings\cisco6509.JPG" "c:\test\!N!cisco6509.jpg" needs to be TWO lines within the FOR. As iis, it doesn't DO the copy, it just previews it. To activate it, remove the ECHO. set /a N+=1 copy "U:\Visio Drawings\cisco6509.JPG" "c:\test\!N!cisco6509.jpg" ===================================== If at first you don't succeed, you're about average. M2

The original line was: echo copy "%%a" "c:\test\!N!%%~Na.txt" The fact that it expanded the %%a but not the !N! means that you did not put this line in your file: setLocal EnableDelayedExpansion Did you think that line was not important?