Batch file to copy and rename files from multiple subdirectories recursively

Question

I have a lot of files in subdirectories, which i want to have

in one folder without subdirectories
renamed with the uppermost directory as prefix followed by its genuine file name.

E.g.:

dir1\dir2\dir3\fileA.abc --> Output\dir1-fileA.abc

dir4\dir5\fileB.def --> Output\dir4-fileB.def

I tried to adapt the solution given in Batch file to copy and rename files from multiple directories for my purposes with the following code, but it is getting stuck in an endless loop as it seems.

Any ideas how to fix this?

pushd "C:\SomeDirectory"
if not exist "Output\*" md Output
for /D %%D in (*) do (
    if /I not "%%D" == "Output" (
        for /R %%J in ("*.*") do (
            copy /B /Y "%%~fJ" "Output\%%D-%%~nxJ" >nul
        )
    )
)

pause

batman567 batman567 · Accepted Answer · 2021-04-21T10:59:47

It looks as though your Output directory is actually "inside" your source directory. Then when you are copying/moving files to Output - you are actually just increasing the number of input files that need to be processed. Classic endless loop :-)

Batch file to copy and rename files from multiple subdirectories recursively

1 Answers