Run cmd.exe from PowerShell

Question

I am trying to run some unit tests using PowerShell. I have a command that (sort of) works: ``` $output = & $vsTestPath $TestAssembly $logger $TestCaseFilter 2>&1 ``` The problem with this is that the standard out and standard error streams don't come out in the right order - they get mixed up. One solution to this (from here) is to use cmd.exe, but I cannot get this to work. I feel like I've tried everything I can think of. Here's what I have: ``` $vsTestPath = "C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio 12.0\Common7\IDE\CommonExtensions\Microsoft\TestWindow\vstest.console.exe" $TestAssembly = "C:\IntegrationTesting\Test Application\Ads.Slms.IntegrationTesting.Web.Smartfill.dll" $output = & cmd.exe /c $vsTestPath $TestAssembly 2`>`&1 ``` This last line does not work. Wierdly, if I just have ``` $output = & cmd.exe /c $vsTestPath 2`>`&1 ``` Then this runs, but of course it's no use to me. It's the second parameter that's the problem. Other things I've tried. How can I get this to…

Accepted Answer

When you run this PowerShell command,

```
& cmd.exe /c $vsTestPath $TestAssembly 2`>`&1
```

PowerShell produces this command line:

```
cmd.exe /c "C:\Program Files (x86)\BlaBlaBla.exe" "C:\IntegrationTesting\Test Application\BlaBlaBla.dll" 2>&1
```

PowerShell encloses values of `$vsTestPath` and `$TestAssembly` in quotes as they contain spaces and the first character is not a quote itself. Now you have to understand how `cmd` processes this command line (see `cmd /?`):

```
If /C or /K is specified, then the remainder of the command line after
the switch is processed as a command line, where the following logic is
used to process quote (") characters:

1.  If all of the following conditions are met, then quote characters
        on the command line are preserved:

- no /S switch
        - exactly two quote characters
        - no special characters between the two quote characters,
          where special is one of: &<>()@^|
        - there are one or more whitespace characters between the
          two quote characters
        - the string between the two quote characters is the name
          of an executable file.

2.  Otherwise, old behavior is to see if the first character is
        a quote character and if so, strip the leading character and
        remove the last quote character on the command line, preserving
        any text after the last quote character.
```

As you can see, we have more than two quotes and first character is quote, so `cmd` will strip first and last quote from the command line:

```
C:\Program Files (x86)\BlaBlaBla.exe" "C:\IntegrationTesting\Test Application\BlaBlaBla.dll 2>&1
```

Now you actually starting `C:\Program` with some arguments, and you very likely does not have `C:\Program.exe` or `C:\Program.cmd`. Solution: add extra quotes to make `cmd` happy:

```
& cmd.exe /c `" $vsTestPath $TestAssembly 2`>`&1 `"
cmd.exe /c " "C:\Program Files (x86)\BlaBlaBla.exe" "C:\IntegrationTesting\Test Application\BlaBlaBla.dll" 2>&1 "
"C:\Program Files (x86)\BlaBlaBla.exe" "C:\IntegrationTesting\Test Application\BlaBlaBla.dll" 2>&1
```

Run cmd.exe from PowerShell

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