How do you tag one file onto the end of another?
in [Windows XP New Users]
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From: J. P. Gilliver (John) on 25 Oct 2009 05:05 I know one way to join files: in a command box, copy /b filea+fileb filec .. However, if filea is huge, this takes a noticeable time, because the entirety of filea is copied to filec (followed by fileb, obviously). I know with text files, you can just append things to another file - e. g. dir >> filea will I think append a directory listing to filea, or type fileb >> filea will append fileb to filea - but only if it's a text file. Anyone know how to concatenate arbitrary files, without involving a third file? -- J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G.5AL-IS-P--Ch++(p)Ar(a)T0H+Sh0!:`)DNAf ** http://www.soft255.demon.co.uk/G6JPG-PC/JPGminPC.htm for ludicrously outdated thoughts on PCs. ** Mathematics is the language with which God has written the universe. -Galileo Galilei, physicist and astronomer (1564-1642)
From: Anteaus on 1 Nov 2009 05:07 This task is probably a little beyond batch language. I would suggest trying AutoIt's FileWrite command, which can append data to an existing file. http://autoitscript.com "J. P. Gilliver (John)" wrote: > Mathematics is the language with which God has written the universe. -Galileo > Galilei, physicist and astronomer (1564-1642) A surprising example to choose, in view of what the Inquisition did to Galileo for the simple act of publishing his understandings of our solar system. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/galileo/life.html It is possible that if Galileo had not done so, science would have remained the province of underground 'heretics' and that today there would be no computers, nothing of modern tech, for that matter. Instead we'd all be living like Harrid and Sallis of Ver Ager, in an enforced state of mediaevalism designed to secure the power of the ecclesiastical rulers. We all owe a great deal to Galileo, not just as a scientist but as a proponent of free speech and human-rights. Today, whenever you speak your mind freely about the nature of the universe... or about anything - think of Galileo.
From: J. P. Gilliver (John) on 1 Nov 2009 09:41 In message <1DAE1A34-9992-41EB-AD14-45D34566D9FC(a)microsoft.com>, Anteaus <Anteaus(a)discussions.microsoft.com> writes: >This task is probably a little beyond batch language. I would suggest trying >AutoIt's FileWrite command, which can append data to an existing file. > >http://autoitscript.com Thanks for that; I suspect it's too complicated for the person I had in mind. I have a friend who - for reasons we needn't go into here - concatenates files (usually video files), by the simple expedient of copy /b filea+fileb filec which does the trick (and more quickly than loading them into a video editing prog. - he knows what he's doing); however, I was watching him do it once when filea was much bigger than the others (there were actually several), and it seemed a pity to have to wait for the system to copy the huge filea, when all he wanted was the others stuck onto the end of it (he didn't have any need for filea to be retained unmodified). Especially when I know that the ">>" operator works for text files - as in dir >> filez.txt will tag the output of the dir command onto the end of filez.txt (much as dir > filez.txt will create filez.txt and then put the dir output into it). I found/find it odd that this facility works, but only for text files; the mechanism is already there, obviously, but I can't see any way round it. Ho hum. > >"J. P. Gilliver (John)" wrote: > >> Mathematics is the language with which God has written the universe. -Galileo >> Galilei, physicist and astronomer (1564-1642) > >A surprising example to choose, in view of what the Inquisition did to >Galileo for the simple act of publishing his understandings of our solar >system. Hmm, the choice of that quote had nothing to do with the subject of the thread - they're picked at random (by an ancient DOS utility called Tomsystems Quote!) from a file of such that I have accumulated over the years. If you mean it's odd of itself, I just thought it was a pleasing thought; Galileo himself, I suspect, either doubted the existence of God and just thought it was a clever thing to say, or didn't think the Inquisition represented God. [] >It is possible that if Galileo had not done so, science would have remained >the province of underground 'heretics' and that today there would be no >computers, nothing of modern tech, for that matter. Instead we'd all be >living like Harrid and Sallis of Ver Ager, in an enforced state of >mediaevalism designed to secure the power of the ecclesiastical rulers. One fears that this is at least a consequence - if not consciously the actual aim - of some of the more extreme extremists in some countries. (Even including Christians - some of them are very against research/work in certain areas. But that is getting way off-topic, especially for a newusers 'group.) > >We all owe a great deal to Galileo, not just as a scientist but as a >proponent of free speech and human-rights. Today, whenever you speak your >mind freely about the nature of the universe... or about anything - think of >Galileo. > Indeed. (And others, of course.) -- J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G.5AL-IS-P--Ch++(p)Ar(a)T0H+Sh0!:`)DNAf ** http://www.soft255.demon.co.uk/G6JPG-PC/JPGminPC.htm for ludicrously outdated thoughts on PCs. ** "I'm a self-made man, but I think if I had to do it over again, I'd call in someone else." - Roland Young
From: Anteaus on 2 Nov 2009 13:59 Quickly knocked this together and it seems to do the trick: ***************************** ; concat.au3 - compile to concat.exe if $cmdLine[0]<>2 then msgbox(32,"File Concatenator","Usage: concat existingfile additionaldata") exit endif ; Get the files to merge from the commandline: ;(Alternatively you could hardcode them here, or use an .ini) $mainFile=$cmdLine[1] $addFile=$cmdLine[2] ; Open files, and get handles to file buffers ; 17=binary write mode, 16=binary read mode $hdlMain = FileOpen($mainFile,17) if @error then msgbox(64,"Error","Cannot open target file for writing") exit endif $hdlAdd = FileOpen($addFile,16) if @error then msgbox(64,"Error","Cannot open source file for reading") exit endif ; Do the business: $data=FileRead($hdlAdd) FileWrite($hdlMain,$data) ; Close-off files (Not essential in Autoit, but good general coding practice) FileClose($hdlAdd) FileClose($hdlMain) exit *************************************** Compile with the Autoit compiler, available from http://autoitscript.com Note that it works by loading the entire contents of the additional file into RAM. This works well for files of reasonable size, but might hit issues if the second file is larger than the machine's free RAM. In that case it might be necessary to segment the file, which does get a trifle more complicated. Lines beginning ; are comments. "J. P. Gilliver (John)" wrote: > Thanks for that; I suspect it's too complicated for the person I had in > mind. >
From: Richard on 7 Nov 2009 10:56
> "J. P. Gilliver (John)" <G6JPG(a)soft255.demon.co.uk> wrote in message > news:Ta5FQGaKTB5KFwoY(a)soft255.demon.co.uk... > I know one way to join files: in a command box, > > copy /b filea+fileb filec > > . However, if filea is huge, this takes a noticeable time, because > the entirety of filea is copied to filec (followed by fileb, > obviously). I know with text files, you can just append things to > another file - e. g. > > dir >> filea > > will I think append a directory listing to filea, or > > type fileb >> filea > > will append fileb to filea - but only if it's a text file. > > Anyone know how to concatenate arbitrary files, without involving a third > file? To append fileB to fileA: copy /b fileA+fileB fileA FWIW. --Richard |