How to have powershell script execute batch command in same terminal

Question

I have a powershell 2 script that I'm trying to develop. The purpose of this script is to wrap around a batch script and intelligently choose what version of said batch script to run. Somewhere along the lines in my code I have some logic that goes like this:

& $myCommand $args

$myCommand is the fully qualified filename of the batch file I want to run. $args is the args passed into this script. This works except it opens up a command window when running $myCommand. How do I prevent this so that the output is within the same powershell shell?

What's odd is that if I execute the command directly, it shows up the way I want it. So something like:

C:\myCommand.bat $args

Given that I need to choose which command I want to run at runtime, how do I make it so the output is in the same shell when I use the '&' to execute the command in the variable? Thanks!

Paul · Accepted Answer · 2014-10-28 14:46:31Z

7

Use Start-Process with the -NoNewWindow parameter instead of &:

Start-Process -filepath C:\myCommand.bat -argumentList @("arg1","arg2") -NoNewWindow

answered Oct 28, 2014 at 14:46

Paul

5,9512 gold badges27 silver badges42 bronze badges

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

2 Comments

Jason Thompson Over a year ago

That did the trick. A couple of notes for people who may try this: 1.) The filepath has to include the extension. It is not good enough to have the var set to C:\foo, but it must be set to C:\foo.bat. 2.) This works a lot like adding the & to the end of a BASH command. To have the process called synchronously, you have to supply a -Wait argument. 3.) If you're just wanting to pass the args through, you can put $args instead of @("arg1", "arg2") since $args is a String[].

Paul Over a year ago

@JasonThompson everything true, i just specified the array because some people just make $args a string

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

How to have powershell script execute batch command in same terminal

1 Answer 1

2 Comments

Your Answer

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

1 Answer 1

2 Comments

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Related