nmake - how to force echo command to output the tab character?

Question

How to force echo command to output a tab character in MS nmake makefile? Verbatim tabs inserted right into a string after echo command are removed by nmake and don't show up in the output file.

all :
    @echo I WANT TO OUTPUT THE <TAB> CHARACTER HERE! > output.txt

Answer 1

You can use a variable with TAB char. Put this lines in your .bat file:

set tab=[stroke TAB char from your keyboard]
echo a%tab%b>yourfile.txt

Doing so, yourfile.txt will have text a[TAB]b

Answer 2

As a workaround, you can create a file containing the tab character, named input.txt (not using nmake), and then say:

all :
    @copy /b input.txt output.txt

Answer 3

I assume you already have tried to put the tab inside quotes?

all:
    @echo "<TAB>" > output.txt

Answer 4

DOS and Windows have ugly text support in native batch files :).

Here is nice way to do your task:

1. install Python interpretator
2. write simple script which appends character with specified code to file
3. call script wherever you want :)

Simple script:

'''
append_char.py - appends character with specified code to end of file

Usage:  append_char.py  filename charcode

'''
import os
import sys

filename = sys.argv[1]
assert os.path.exists(filename)

charcode = int(sys.argv[2])
assert 0 <= charcode <= 255

fh = open(filename, 'ab')
fh.seek(0, os.SEEK_END)
fh.write(chr(charcode))

fh.close()

using this script from batch file you can create any possible file in universe :)

Answer 5

output.txt:
    <<output.txt
I WANT TO OUTPUT THE <TAB> CHARACTER HERE!
<<KEEP

<TAB> represents a literal tab character here of course.

Answer 6

I had the same need. I used the answer using the quotes around the character and just took it one step further.

{tab} means pressing the keyboard tab key in the text editor.

SET tab="{tab}"

SET tab=%tab:~1,1%

The second line extracts the middle character from the quoted string.

Now you can use the %tab% variable with ECHO and, I suspect, anywhere else it's needed.

ECHO %tab%This text is indented, preceded by a tab.

I suspect this technique could be used with other problem characters as well.