How do I echo a TAB char on a command prompt

Question

On a windows batch file, what is the proper way to echo a TAB?

echo A<TAB>B<TAB>C

I know I can type the TAB char between entries, but most editors will display it as a sequence of spaces. Some will even automatically convert them to spaces, I'm looking for something more visual.

Clarification: <TAB> here means the real tab char. I'm looking for the the C \t in a batch script.

Answer 1

Just hit the TAB key in an editor that supports it, Notepad for example.

So, if I enter this:

@echo 1<TAB>b
@echo 2<TAB>c

It would result in this:

Answer 2

As long as you are using an editor that keeps the tabs intect, you could download sed and put it on your path, and then you could do something like:

echo "A`B`C" | sed 's/\t/<TAB>/g'

where each ` is standing in for a real tab.

Answer 3

Limitations such as this are among the reasons to use Windows Script Host or Powershell.

Windows Script Host shipped (ships) with every Windows version from 98 on and can be installed on 95 and NT 4.

Create a file called demo.vbs and paste the following line in it and save it.

WScript.StdOut.WriteLine "a" + chr(9) + "b"

Now, from the directory where you saved it, enter:

demo.vbs

and you should see:

a       b

You can also do

cscript demo.vbs

which will allow you to use the command line switches that cscript provides.

(Tested on Vista.)