Question

How to place a message using inverted commas in VBS script using wshShell.Exec?

Asked by: harnamsc

Greetings to all,

I'm trying to create a few scripts to automate a Wake On LAN and automatic shutdown in my server farm using the freeware poweroff.exe utility. I have a txt file in my managment server D: which contains all the hostnames, IP's and MAC addresses necessary for the WOL and POL functions. My WOL script is working fine, but my POL script has an error. As you can see from the code attached, I've specified parameters with the poweroff.exe command to include a message in the poweroff.exe command so that any users logged in will be prompted to click the cancel button. However the message must be placed in inverted commas, and as a result is causing a syntax error with the WScript.Shell.Exec("") method.

Is there a way for me to include a message in inverted commas within the WScript.Shell.Exec("") method? I've been trying to find a solution for days but with no success.

Const ForReading = 1
 
Set objFSO = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")
Set objFile = objFSO.OpenTextFile("D:\WOL\WorkstationIP.txt", ForReading)
Set wshShell = WScript.CreateObject("WScript.Shell")
 
 
Do Until objTextFile.AtEndOfStream
  arrAddress = Split(objTextFile.Readline, " ")
  wshShell.Exec("D:\WOL\poweroff.exe poweroff -remote " & arrAddress(0) & " -warn -warntime 30 -msg "Computer is shutting down. Click CANCEL to abort." -force -quiet")
Loop
 
 
objReadFile.Close
                                  
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Asked On
2009-08-06 at 23:46:31ID24633976
Tags

VBS

,

Scripting

,

Windows Server 2003

Topics

Web Development Software

,

.NET

Participating Experts
2
Points
250
Comments
4

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Answers

 

by: mnialonPosted on 2009-08-07 at 00:55:48ID: 25040604

if you want to use " in your text, you have to write ""
plus " for beginning of the string, that means you have to write """
(3 times ")
try that :
"""Computer is shutting down. Click CANCEL to abort."""

michel

 

by: CodeCruiserPosted on 2009-08-07 at 06:16:44ID: 25042304

You can use the chr(34) to produce ". So this line
wshShell.Exec("D:\WOL\poweroff.exe poweroff -remote " & arrAddress(0) & " -warn -warntime 30 -msg "Computer is shutting down. Click CANCEL to abort." -force -quiet")

Would be
wshShell.Exec("D:\WOL\poweroff.exe poweroff -remote " & arrAddress(0) & " -warn -warntime 30 -msg " & chr(34) & "Computer is shutting down. Click CANCEL to abort." & chr(34) & " -force -quiet")

 

by: harnamscPosted on 2009-08-09 at 05:07:55ID: 25053897

Greetings to all and sorry for the late reply, its a long weekend where I am.

mnialon: When I tried using triple quotes, I still got a vbs error. But when I tried double quotes I didn't get an error? I.e. the line """Computer is shutting down. Click CANCEL to abort.""" doesn't seem to work, but the line ""Computer is shutting down. Click CANCEL to abort."" seems to be accepted.

CodeCruiser: No problems with the code you provided. On my laptop it was able to execute.

I'll be testing the code on the servers once I'm back after the weekend. Will keep you posted as to the results!

 

by: harnamscPosted on 2009-08-11 at 00:45:59ID: 25066843

There are some spelling errors in the objFile in my code, but otherwise the solutions provided by mnialon (after changing from """ to "") and CodeCruiser work. Thanks everyone!

20120131-EE-VQP-002

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