How do I iterate over a set of folders in Windows Shell?

Question

I'm currently trying to write a .cmd Windows Shell script that would iterate over a set of folders. However even the following simplest script:

echo "%ROOT%"
for %%f in ("%ROOT%\Binaries\" ) do (
    echo "%%f"
    if not exist "%%f\Subfolder"
        md "%%f\Subfolder"
)

outputs:

CurrentDir>echo "<ActualPathToRoot>"
"<ActualPathToRoot>"
%f\Subfolder was unexpected at this time
CurrentDir>if exists "%f\Subfolder"

What am I doing wrong? How do I alter that script so that it iterates over that one folder and once it see there's no subfolder named "Subfolder" it creates that subfolder? Also is there a good tutorial on writing such scripts?

Answer 1

For (sub)folder-iteration you need to use a different for parameter.

So if you want to list all directories of C: you should do this:

for /d %%A in (C:\*) do echo %%A

Note the parameter /d which indicates a directory. To go into subdirectories you need to do a recursive for with /r

for /r C:\Windows %%A in (*.jpg) do echo %%A

This would iterate through all Windows subdirectories looking for JPGs. Low behold you should be able to do /d /r and this reference suggests you can - I simply can't, but maybe you are able to do this?

A workaround I quickly jotted down is to just do a dir of all directories in a for loop:

for /f "delims=" %%A in ('dir /ad/s/b') do echo %%A

Note that dir is used in conjunction with /ad/s/b which performs a recursive listing of directories, printing the names of the directories found.
With these tools in your hand you should be able to do your if-subfolder construct. Note that you might need