“∩╗┐” is not recognized as an internal or external command, operable program or batch file.

Almost all of us must have encountered the following message in the Output window while getting a batch (.bat) file executed in Visual Studio as part of the build process for some project.

“∩╗┐” is not recognized as an internal or external command, operable program or batch file.

Atleast, I used to get (till now, when I found out its reason & eliminated it) this message randomly for my different projects. Because this message caused no harm, and the build process continued smoothly, I almost always looked over this message.

However, I recently started getting this message more commonly for my Build process batch files, and it started troubling me. I was confused because this message occured randomly, it occured for some batch files, but not for others. What confused me more was the fact that I had 2 copies of the same batch process for 2 projects, on one of them, the message appeared, and on the other, it did not.

Googling provided no solutions. With no other options, I started playing with the Encoding for the batch files used to save them.

I noticed that a new file created in VS (I have 2008) was saved with the Encoding of:

“Unicode (UTF-8 with signature) – Codepage 65001”

by default.

Changing the Encoding to:

“Western European (Windows) – Codepage 1252”

resolved the issue. So, if you are also facing the same problem, just change your Encoding for the batch file, save it & rebuild your project. the error should be gone.

Here are the precise steps you can follow:

1. Open the file in Visual Studio
2. Go to File->Advanced Save Options
3. Change the Encoding to the above specified value:
   “Western European (Windows) – Codepage 1252”
   It should be the first item in the drop down list.
4. Click Ok
5. Save your file, and rebuild. The message should no longer be present there.