6

This question and this blog post address how to pass particular parameters into a PowerShell script from a batch file.

How can one pass all parameters into the PowerShell script? Basically I want to splat all the parameters so that the batch file passes all arguments through transparently.

Edit for more context:

I'm currently using a line like:

PowerShell.exe -Command "& '%~dpn0.ps1' '%1' '%2'"

This works, but creates a redundancy between the files such that, if I update the PowerShell script to take different arguments, I have to update the batch script as well. What would be nice is if I could do something like:

PowerShell.exe -Command "& '%~dpn0.ps1' '%*'"
Improve this question
3
  • Could you provide an example of what you want? Cmd does not have splatting like PSv3+ has. Commented Sep 11, 2017 at 20:38
  • @TheIncorrigible1 I currently use a line like PowerShell.exe -Command "& '%~dpn0.ps1' '%1' '%2'"; I would like to be able to pass through all parameters without having to enumerate them. Commented Sep 11, 2017 at 20:39
  • I'm not sure if this is possible or how, but it would be nice to do something like PowerShell.exe -Command "& '%~dpn0.ps1' '%*'" Commented Sep 11, 2017 at 20:40

2 Answers 2

Reset to default
8

Try the following:

powershell -File "%~dpn0.ps1" %*

  • In batch files, %* represents all arguments passed.[1]

  • -File is the parameter to use to invoke scripts via PowerShell's CLI.

  • All remaining arguments are then passed through as as-is (whereas -Command would subject them to another round of interpretation by PowerShell[2] ).

[1] Note that for cmd.exe (batch files) to recognize an argument with embedded whitespace as a single argument, you must enclose it in "...".
For instance, if you wanted to pass arguments a and b c to batch file file.cmd, you'd have to call it as
file a "b c".
To pass embedded " instances, \-escape them; e.g., "\"b c\"" makes PowerShell see "b c", including the double quotes.
If you respect these rules, %* - without quoting - properly passes the array of arguments through.
Do not use "%*" - it won't work as expected.

[2] In effect, -Command causes all following arguments to be joined by a single space each, and the resulting string is then interpreted as a PowerShell command - that is, after the arguments are parsed by the rules of cmd.exe (batch files), they are subject to another round of parsing, by PowerShell.
Unfortunately, PowerShell has always worked this way, but the behavior is obscure, and is likely to cause even more confusion in the Unix world, now that PowerShell has gone cross-platform - see this GitHub issue.

Improve this answer
Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

6 Comments

This will miss arguments passed that have spaces in them. %* will literally just dump all the arguments.
@TheIncorrigible1: No: if you pass them properly quoted to the batch file, they are passed through intact.
@TheIncorrigible1: There's no way around passing arguments properly by the rules of the calling shell, which is cmd.exe. Once you do that, the command works as intended.
@TheIncorrigible1 Running test.cmd a "b c" d where test.cmd has the content powershell -File "%~dpn0.ps1" %* will invoke test.ps1 with 3 arguments: a, b c, and d. You can verify that by echoing $args in the PowerShell script.
Works in my instance. The extra quotes in my example were due to using -Command instead of -File as explained in the answer. Thank you!
|
0

I wanted to do something similar, but a bit more complicated recently, and the answers here and information on a few sites helped me a lot. In my case the parameter to be passed from the cmd was a variable number of paths, often with spaces, potentially with $ and & - and the parameter was to be splatted, i.e. it had to have commas between strings, or the script would interpret it as a different argument. No matter what I did, I would break something. So in the end I had concatenated all the individual entries into a single variable, introduced escapes for $ and &, and passed it to the intermediate script:

set a="%~1"
if [%1]==[] goto end
:loop
shift
set b="%~1"
if [%1]==[] goto execute
set a=%a% %b%
goto loop
:execute
set a=%a:&=`&%
set a=%a:$=`$%
powershell -file (fullpath)\intermediatescript.ps1 %a%
:end
exit

which contains just a single line, invoking the main script:

& '(fullpath)\mainscript.ps1' -Path:$args

(I'm sharing this in case someone looks for a solution to the problem similar to mine or if wiser people spot a problem with my approach that I failed to encounter so far.)

Improve this answer

1 Comment

try echo %* - might simplify your approach a bit.

Your Answer

By clicking “Post Your Answer”, you agree to our terms of service and acknowledge you have read our privacy policy.

Start asking to get answers

Find the answer to your question by asking.

Ask question

Explore related questions

See similar questions with these tags.