How do I append an empty line in a text file using the command line?
echo hi >a.txt
echo >>a.txt
echo arun >>a.txt
Here the output comes as:
hi
echo on
arun
So how could I append an empty line? I want it to be like this:
hi
arun
When I added this line on code @echo off, it said echo off. How can it be done?
In the Windows command prompt, try:
echo.>> a.txt
Note that there is no space between echo and .; if there is one, it will output a dot. There is also no space between the . and the >>; anything in between would be output to the file, even whitespace characters.
See the Microsoft documentation for echo.
If this were in bash, your first try would have been correct:
echo >> a.txt
But in Windows, the unqualified echo command tests whether there is a command prompt or not (echo off turns the prompt off and echo on turns it back on).
@echo OFF doing this writes ECHO IS OFF rather than a blank line. If you add a space between the dot and the double chevron then it works as expected (i.e. echo. >> file.txt)At Windows Prompt:
echo. >> a.txt
At BASH Prompt:
echo >> a.txt
(Echo by default sends a trailing newline)
-n do not output the trailing newline
I've battling with this for a while here's a tip of how i fixed it:
On you batch, put "echo(>> textfile.txt" (without quotation) without spaces between the echo command and the redirector or you'll get a line with a space. Not ideal if you're compiling a file to paste somewhere like excel and need the cell to be empty like i did for whatever reason.
Hope it helps.
It should be possible with a simple
echo hi\n >> a.txt
