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How do you enter something at a DOS prompt Programmatically?

Answer 1

+5 A:

You can pipe in a 'y' character into the program like so:

echo y | executable.exe

Multiple lines can be entered like so:

(echo y
echo n) | executable.exe

...which will pass first 'y' then 'n'.

See tip from Microsoft here.

James Kolpack 2010-03-16 19:25:57

How does it know when to enter the y, when you pipe like this?

LonnieBest 2010-03-16 19:35:28

It doesn't, it just sits in the buffer until the program asks for input

Jason 2010-03-16 19:52:19

James, that worked. The script crashes, but not before it does the work I need done. Thanks.

LonnieBest 2010-03-16 21:58:51

What do you do when you want to pass more than one command in?

LonnieBest 2010-03-16 23:13:23

I've edited the response with the way to do this.

James Kolpack 2010-03-17 00:16:58

James, in my case, after the "y" comes a username prompt follows. But, at that point, I'd like to exit out instead of entering the username and password, because after the "y" is entered, the needed work is accomplished. Is there any way to pass a 2nd command that will make the console exit even though, that at that point, it is at another prompt that doesn't expect such a command?

LonnieBest 2010-03-17 13:00:55

You *might* be able to echo in the Ctrl+C ascii character - (\x03) - but I'm trying it now on an exe that should break, and it's not. An alternate approach could be to host/monitor your application in another executable. There are capabilities for this in .NET using System.Diagnositics.Proceess - check out this article for some VB-based examples http://www.thescarms.com/dotnet/Process.aspx . Using that approach, you could monitor StandardOutput, wait for the prompt, enter 'y', and then terminate the application.

James Kolpack 2010-03-17 14:28:05

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How do you enter something at a DOS prompt Programmatically?

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