How do I use a for loop and output to a different directory

Question

 usage: pdftotext [options] <PDF-file> [<text-file>]

I'm using pdftotext (xpft, usage above) to covert all pdfs in a directory (and subdirectories) to textfiles. It doesn't matter if structure is preserved or not I just want to write the files to a different directory.

I have cmd cd already pointing at the directory ("C:\input" say ).

So if the path of a given input file is

 C:\input\filename.pdf

And I want to output to

 C:\output\filename.txt

My command:

 for /r %i in (*.pdf) do pdftotext "%i" -raw "C:\output\%i"

Nearly works, but it attempts to output to

 C:\input\C:\output\filename

which obviously causes an error.

How do I solve this?

score 3 · Accepted Answer · edited Jun 12 '20 at 13:48

How do I use a for loop and output to a different directory

Use the following command:

for /r %i in (*.pdf) do pdftotext -raw "%i" "C:\output\%~ni.txt"

%~ni Expands %i to a file name only (i.e. removes drive letter, path and .pdf extension)
%~ni.txt also appends a new extension, .txt

Extended syntax

When an argument is used to supply a filename then the following extended syntax can be applied:

we are using the variable %1 (but this works for any parameter)

%~f1 Expand %1 to a Fully qualified path name - C:\utils\MyFile.txt

%~d1 Expand %1 to a Drive letter only - C:

%~p1 Expand %1 to a Path only e.g. \utils\ this includes a trailing \ which will be interpreted as an escape character by some commands.

%~n1 Expand %1 to a file Name without file extension C:\utils\MyFile or if only a path is present (with no trailing backslash) - the last folder in that path.

%~x1 Expand %1 to a file eXtension only - .txt

%~s1 Change the meaning of f, n, s and x to reference the Short 8.3 name (if it exists.)

%~1 Expand %1 removing any surrounding quotes (")

%~a1 Display the file attributes of %1

%~t1 Display the date/time of %1

%~z1 Display the file size of %1

%~$PATH:1 Search the PATH environment variable and expand %1 to the fully qualified name of the first match found.

The modifiers above can be combined:

%~dp1 Expand %1 to a drive letter and path only

%~sp1 Expand %1 to a path shortened to 8.3 characters

%~nx2 Expand %2 to a file name and extension only

Source Command Line arguments (Parameters)

How do I use a for loop and output to a different directory

1 Answers1

How do I use a for loop and output to a different directory

Extended syntax

Further reading