Is there a short cut for desktop folder in Windows batch?

Question

C:\Documents and Settings\Administrator\Desktop

I don't want to type the above each time to refer to a file on the desktop

Answer 1

You can use "%USERPROFILE%\Desktop" but I don't know from which version of Windows it is built in.

If your want the real folder where Desktop is located then use this code in the bach

for /F "skip=2 tokens=3* delims= " %%a in ('reg query "HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\User Shell Folders" /v Desktop') do set DesktopFolder="%%a"

This requires the reg.exe to be available (again, I don't know from which version of Window it is there) and it will set the DesktopFolder variable to the path of the Desktop.

Answer 2

The hybrid of Anders can be a bit more simple and readable, with the method described here hybrid scripting by Tom Lavedas.

@if (@X)==(@Y) @goto :Dummy @end/* Batch part

@echo off
SETLOCAL ENABLEEXTENSIONS
for /f "delims=" %%x in ('cscript //E:JScript //nologo "%~f0"') do set desk=%%x
echo desktop path is %desk%
goto :EOF

***** Now JScript begins *****/
WScript.Echo(WScript.CreateObject("Shell.Application").Namespace(16).Self.Path);

Answer 3

If you absolutely need to have a batch file, but want to use the power of windows scripting host, you might want to try a WSH/batch hybrid

Batch/WSH hybrid:

@if (1==1) @if(1==0) @ELSE
@echo off&SETLOCAL ENABLEEXTENSIONS
for /f "delims=" %%x in ('cscript //E:JScript //nologo "%~f0"') do set desk=%%x
echo desktop path is %desk%
@goto :EOF
@end @ELSE
WScript.Echo(WScript.CreateObject("Shell.Application").Namespace(16).Self.Path);
@end

See ShellSpecialFolderConstants if you need to get the path of some other shell folder

Answer 4

set UserDesktop=%UserProfile%\Desktop

if exist %Public% (
    set SharedDesktop=%Public%\Desktop
) else (
    set SharedDesktop=%AllUsersProfile%\Desktop
)

So now you can use the Local Variables

%UserDesktop% and %SharedDesktop%

SharedDesktop first case is for Vista and above the else is for XP

ps: before using these variables you should quote then "%UserDesktop%" because Username must have spaces, like ...\Bill Gates\... or \Documents and settings\...