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9.2

Is it better to comment a batch file with :: or REM?

Asked by BillDL in MS DOS

Hi Experts

I've asked this as the result of a specific suggestion made by our expert leew in another DOS-related question in which I was contributing:

"I don't know if BillDL and I have had this debate - but I strongly advise AGAINST using :: as a comment sign - it's not what it was intended for and in certain circumstances, it can have unexpected results.  If you want to comment in your batch files, then use the appropriate comment command - REM"

I am not intending to discredit or cross swords with leew, it's just that this has me curious simply because I've read conflicting explanations of which is better and I would like to hear the reasons.

I read (on the pages of other very well qualified IT gurus like leew) that lines preceded with REM actually have to be parsed and THEN disregarded, whereas the :: symbol is completely ignored, and thereby speeds up the processing of very long and heavily commented batch files.

I can see that an accidental space between the 2 colons could play havoc because the batch file would consider it to be a Label and then probably consider the 2nd colon to be an illegal Label name, being a reserved character.

What I'm most intrigued about is what kind of circumstances the :: may cause unwanted results.  I've used :: to comment batch files for a long time now and it's entirely possible that some of them didn't work because of such a circumstance arising.

Does anyone know of any good test batch files that would demonstrate unwanted results?

I hope this doesn't cause a riot of differing opinions from other experts who like using ::  :-)

Thanks
Bill
[+][-]12/09/08 03:06 AM, ID: 23128236Accepted Solution

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Zone: MS DOS
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Solution Provided By: leew
Participating Experts: 1
Solution Grade: A
 
[+][-]12/09/08 04:07 AM, ID: 23128445Author Comment

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