# renaming in dos and have to use "-" character, need workaround



## rayburn (Jan 8, 2004)

Hello all,
I need to rename 300 .asp files from _fr.asp to -fr.asp

I tried this
ren *_fr.* *-fr.*

and ended up with
_fr.asp-fr.asp

I really don't know much in dos, but I presume that "-" is an reserved/escape character, does anyone know a workaround or way I can rename my files using "-"?

Thanks


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## Perfesser (Jun 2, 2003)

since the dash is showing up in the new filename it may not be a restricted character. (I think it is, though, and you'll get an (invalid character in filename error).
Thy this 
ren ???_fr.asp ???-fr.asp
with questionmarks in place of the leading characters of the name (ie 033_fr.asp use 3 ?marks).
The star is a wildcard (match any) and everything after it is ignored; the ? is a one place wildcard.


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## rayburn (Jan 8, 2004)

That did it!
Thank you very much Perfesser, you have saved me a bunch of time.
Much appreciated.


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