Echo
Updated: January 21, 2005
Turns the command echoing feature on or off, or displays a message. Used without parameters, echo displays the current echo setting.
Syntax
echo [{on | off}] [Message]
Parameters
{ on| off}
Specifies whether to turn the command echoing
feature on or off.
Message
Specifies the text that you want to display on the
screen.
/?
Displays help at the command prompt.
Remarks
- The echo Message command is useful when echo is turned off. To display a message that is several lines long without displaying other commands, you can include several echo Message commands after the echo off command in your batch program.
- If you use echo off, the command prompt does not appear on your screen. To display the command prompt, type echo on.
- To prevent echoing of a line, insert an at sign (@) in front of a command in a batch program.
- To echo a blank line on the screen, type:
echo.
-
To display a pipe (|) or redirection character (< or >) when you are using echo, use a caret character immediately before the pipe or redirection character (for example, ^>, ^<, or ^| ). If you need to use the caret character (^), type two (^^).
Examples
The following example is a batch program that includes a
three-line message preceded by and then followed by a blank
line:
echo off
echo.
echo This batch program
echo formats and checks
echo new disks
echo.
If you want to turn echo off and you do not want to echo the echo command, type an at sign (@) before the command as follows:
@echo off
You can use the if and echo commands on the same command line. For example:
if exist *.rpt echo The report has arrived.
Formatting legend
| Format | Meaning |
| Italic | Information that the user must supply |
| Bold | Elements that the user must type exactly as shown |
| Ellipsis (...) | Parameter that can be repeated several times in a command line |
| Between brackets ([]) | Optional items |
| Between braces ({}); choices separated by pipe (|). Example: {even|odd} | Set of choices from which the user must choose only one |
| Courier font | Code or program output |