I'm new to the batch file world and am in desperate help for something I'm sure is very basic. I need to copy a .txt file into the folder that contains my DOS program (called wavgen) and rename it accelerogram.dat so that wavgen can read it. The program has to be started, and an input of 0.05 has to be entered. Then the output file compatible.dat needs to be copied as/ saved as a different name. I'll be repeating this code, so if I need 5 runs of the program, there will be five repeats of this, and the xcopy should basically dump input into the accelerogram.dat file and save the output from the compatible.dat file into a separate file with a new name. ERASE accelerogram.dat XCOPY A1.dat to accelerogram.dat (? confused how to code this) START wavgen Somehow prompt an input of 0.05 XCOPY compatible.dat to C1.dat (? again confused) Any help with any portion of this would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!! CK

So you want to delete the existing accelerogram.dat file rename A1.dat to accelerogram.dat START wavgen echo .05 rename compatible.dat to C1.dat? and then do that 5 times in a row So that sound like the basic flow of how you want this thing to work?

My main issue is getting the program to read 0.05 ... everything else is working now. So when the program starts, it automatically reads the .dat files required, and then asks for a damping ratio. So I have to type 0.05 and then press enter for the program to continue. I've tried just placing the value 0.05 after "start wavgen" on the same line, on the next line, etc. Nothing.. Thanks for your help!!

Try this: echo 0.05|wavgen The pipe character (|) runs the command to the left of it and makes its output the input of the command to the right of it. It may or may not work, depending on how wavgen gets its input.

I like Klint's solution if it works, the problem is not knowing anything about this wavgen app it's hard to tell you a solution. What I'm thinking is, instead of calling wavgen from the batch, have it call a .vbs that opens wavgen then sends the keys you want. Save the following, editing how you need and add call wscript "the .vbs file" to your batch set wshshell = createobject("Wscript.shell") wshshell.run "cmd /k wavgen" wscript.sleep 1000 WshShell.SendKeys "."&"0"&"5" WshShell.SendKeys "{ENTER}" WshShell.Sendkeys "%{f4}"

WshShell.SendKeys "."&"0"&"5" Don't do this. ".05" is much easier to read, and executes faster. wshshell.run "cmd /k wavgen" Don't use .Run(), use .Exec(). Exec() gives you access to the job's StdIn.