Resolve absolute path from relative path and/or file name

In batch files, as in standard C programs, argument 0 contains the path to the currently executing script. You can use %~dp0 to get only the path portion of the 0th argument (which is the current script) - this path is always a fully qualified path.

You can also get the fully qualified path of your first argument by using %~f1, but this gives a path according to the current working directory, which is obviously not what you want.

Personally, I often use the %~dp0%~1 idiom in my batch file, which interpret the first argument relative to the path of the executing batch. It does have a shortcoming though: it miserably fails if the first argument is fully-qualified.

If you need to support both relative and absolute paths, you can make use of Frédéric Ménez's solution: temporarily change the current working directory.

Here's an example that'll demonstrate each of these techniques:

@echo offecho %%~dp0 is "%~dp0"echo %%0 is "%0"echo %%~dpnx0 is "%~dpnx0"echo %%~f1 is "%~f1"echo %%~dp0%%~1 is "%~dp0%~1"rem Temporarily change the current working directory, to retrieve a full path rem   to the first parameterpushd .cd %~dp0echo batch-relative %%~f1 is "%~f1"popd

If you save this as c:\temp\example.bat and the run it from c:\Users\Public as

c:\Users\Public>\temp\example.bat ..\windows

...you'll observe the following output:

%~dp0 is "C:\temp\"%0 is "\temp\example.bat"%~dpnx0 is "C:\temp\example.bat"%~f1 is "C:\Users\windows"%~dp0%~1 is "C:\temp\..\windows"batch-relative %~f1 is "C:\Windows"

the documentation for the set of modifiers allowed on a batch argument can be found here: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/administration/windows-commands/call

I came across a similar need this morning: how to convert a relative path into an absolute path inside a Windows command script.

The following did the trick:

@echo offset REL_PATH=..\..\set ABS_PATH=rem // Save current directory and change to target directorypushd %REL_PATH%rem // Save value of CD variable (current directory)set ABS_PATH=%CD%rem // Restore original directorypopdecho Relative path: %REL_PATH%echo Maps to path: %ABS_PATH%

Most of these answers seem crazy over complicated and super buggy, here's mine -- it works on any environment variable, no %CD% or PUSHD/POPD, or for /f nonsense -- just plain old batch functions. -- The directory & file don't even have to exist.

CALL :NORMALIZEPATH "..\..\..\foo\bar.txt"SET BLAH=%RETVAL%ECHO "%BLAH%":: ========== FUNCTIONS ==========EXIT /B:NORMALIZEPATH  SET RETVAL=%~f1  EXIT /B