5.2 If a Command Won t Run

5.2 If a Command Won't Run

Some commands in this chapter such as eventquery.vbs or prncnfg.vbs are actually admin scripts written in VBScript. The first time you try to run one of these scripts from the command line, you will see the following message:

 This script should be executed from the command prompt using CSCRIPT.EXE.  For example: CSCRIPT %windir%\System32\EVENTQUERY.vbs <arguments>  To set CScript as the default application to run .vbs files, run the  following: CSCRIPT //H:CSCRIPT //S You can then run %windir%\System32\EVENTQUERY.vbs <arguments> without  preceding the script with CSCRIPT. 

This message is displayed because there are actually two versions of the Windows Script Host:

WSCRIPT

The Windows-based version that provides a properties sheet for configuring how your script will run.

CSCRIPT

The command-line version that uses switches to configure script properties.

By default, WS2003 uses WSCRIPT as its default script host, but the scripts in this chapter require CSCRIPT instead, so you can either use CSCRIPT each time you want to run one of these scripts, like this:

  cscript eventquery.vbs  

omitting " %windir%\System32\ " since eventquery.vbs is already in the system path , or you can type:

  cscript //h:cscript //s  

to change the default script host from WSCRIPT to CSCRIPT, after which you can then run the script simply by typing its filename, like this:

  eventquery.vbs  

If this applies to a particular command in this chapter, the "Notes" section reiterates this information for your convenience.