Compiler error in Windows - include: Invalid argument

[Jim Horton]

I'm trying to compile my first program. I have everything in a batch file. I get the error:
gcc: error: Ic:\gnucobol\BDB2\include: Invalid argument

any assistance would be great.

echo on

rem Compile a COBOL program

rem are env strings already defined? (tried using () here, but it failed so goto it is

if NOT "%COB_MAIN_DIR%" == "" goto cont

rem define env strings

set COB_MAIN_DIR=c:\gnucobol\BDB2\
set COB_CONFIG_DIR=%COB_MAIN_DIR%config
set COB_COPY_DIR=%COB_MAIN_DIR%copy
set COB_CFLAGS=I" %COB_MAIN_DIR%include" %COB_CFLAGS%
set COB_LDFLAGS=L" %COB_MAIN_DIR%lib" %COB_LDFLAGS%
set COB_LIBRARY_PATH=%COB_MAIN_DIR%extras
set PATH=%COB_MAIN_DIR%bin;%PATH%

:cont

rem Start the compiler

cobc -x hello.cbl

[Simon Sobisch]

You'd want to at least use

-set COB_CFLAGS=I" %COB_MAIN_DIR%include" %COB_CFLAGS%
-set COB_LDFLAGS=L" %COB_MAIN_DIR%lib" %COB_LDFLAGS%
+set COB_CFLAGS=-I"%COB_MAIN_DIR%include" %COB_CFLAGS%
+set COB_LDFLAGS=-L"%COB_MAIN_DIR%lib" %COB_LDFLAGS%

but possibly even

+set "COB_CFLAGS=-I"%COB_MAIN_DIR%include" %COB_CFLAGS%"
+set "COB_LDFLAGS=-L"%COB_MAIN_DIR%lib" %COB_LDFLAGS%"

to reduce the amount of issues you can get if those flags already contain a parenthesis or quotes or...

Note: if you use Arnold's builds you can make that much more simpler:

@echo off
c:\gnucobol\BDB2\set_env.cmd cobc -x hello.cbl

Nothing more needed :-)

For older versions of his builds:

@echo off
rem set environment vars
c:\gnucobol\BDB2\set_env.cmd

rem start the compiler
cobc -x hello.cbl

and likely you'd want to replace hello.cbl by %1.cbl (if you want to pass it as argument) or by %1 if you want to be able to "drop" the file onto the bat file.

... just a note: if you want a nice IDE environment: install VSCodium and then drop it to the set_env.cmd - you then can directly use cobc -x hello.cbl in its integrated terminal and can also add "build" tasks that will do this for example for the active file, showing you the errors/warnings/infos in the problem pane and also in the editor window.

[Jim Horton]

Thanks Simon. I finally got it to compile, with your help. I now have a bat file that will compile my code. Thanks!