How do I echo ASCII art that contains special characters in a batch file?

Question

So.. This is (to me anyway) the most important feature of this program. I need this to work. Please don\'t laugh.. (okay you can laugh) but when my program errors, I want it to

Answer 1

Include the following in your script:

:::
:::              _ _,---._
:::           ,-','       `-.___
:::          /-;'               `._
:::         /\/          ._   _,'o \
:::        ( /\       _,--'\,','"`. )
:::         |\      ,'o     \'    //\
:::         |      \        /   ,--'""`-.
:::         :       \_    _/ ,-'         `-._
:::          \        `--'  /                )
:::           `.  \`._    ,'     ________,','
:::             .--`     ,'  ,--` __\___,;'
:::              \`.,-- ,' ,`_)--'  /`.,'
:::               \( ;  | | )      (`-/
:::                 `--'| |)       |-/
:::                   | | |        | |
:::                   | | |,.,-.   | |_
:::                   | `./ /   )---`  )
:::                  _|  /    ,',   ,-'
:::                 ,'|_(    /-<._,' |--,
:::                 |    `--'---.     \/ \
:::                 |          / \    /\  \
:::               ,-^---._     |  \  /  \  \
:::            ,-'        \----'   \/    \--`.
:::           /            \              \   \
:::

for /f "delims=: tokens=*" %%A in ('findstr /b ::: "%~f0"') do @echo(%%A

The image could be placed anywhere within the script. It does not need to be near the FOR statement. I chose ::: as a distinguishing label for each image line because : is used for normal labels, and :: is frequently used as a comment.

2014-10-22 Update

There is an even simpler solution using my REPL.BAT utility - a hybrid JScript/batch script that performs a regex search/replace on stdin and writes the result to stdout. Simply substitute the following line for the FOR statement above:

call repl "^:::" "" a <"%~f0"

REPL.BAT is pure script that will run on any Windows machine from XP onward. Full documentation is embedded within the script. This solution uses the A option to only print lines that were altered.