Question

I have a script which finds specific installed software but I am having trouble also getting the software’s version. For example, say I am getting a list of all Microsoft software installed. Here is what I have thus far:

echo software installed > software_list.txt
echo ================= >>software_list.txt
reg export HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall temp1.txt
find "Microsoft" temp1.txt| find "DisplayName" > temp2.txt
for /f "tokens=2,3 delims==" %%a in (temp2.txt) do (echo %%a >> software_list.txt)

start notepad "software_list.txt"

del temp1.txt temp2.txt

How can I also get the DisplayVersion from the reg export? If I replace DisplayName with DisplayVersion, nothing is even found. Or, is there another avenue I should be taking here?

Answer 1

Replacing DisplayName with DisplayVersion results in an empty output because of the way this line works:

find "Microsoft" temp1.txt| find "DisplayName" > temp2.txt

What this line does is it finds all lines in the temp2.txt file that contain both the Microsoft and DisplayName substrings (that is, it finds the products whose names contain Microsoft). The lines with DisplayVersion, in their turn, contain product version numbers and don’t contain the word Microsoft, which is why you get empty output.

I can suggest a couple of alternative solutions that use WMI:

1. Parse the HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall subkeys using a script (VBScript, PowerShell etc) rather than a batch file, because scripting languages offer much better support for text manipulation. Here’s a VBScript example that outputs the names and versions of installed Microsoft products (products whose names contain Microsoft, to be more precise):

   On Error Resume Next
   
   Const strComputer = "."
   Const HKLM        = &H80000002
   Const strKeyPath  = "SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Uninstall"
   
   Dim oReg, arrSubKeys, strProduct, strDisplayName, strVersion
   
   Set oReg = GetObject("winmgmts:{impersonationLevel=impersonate}!\\" & _ 
        strComputer & "\root\default:StdRegProv")
   
   ' Enumerate the subkeys of the Uninstall key
   oReg.EnumKey HKLM, strKeyPath, arrSubKeys
   For Each strProduct In arrSubKeys
     ' Get the product's display name
     oReg.GetStringValue HKLM, strKeyPath & "\" & strProduct, "DisplayName", strDisplayName
     ' Process only products whose name contain 'Microsoft'
     If InStr(1, strDisplayName, "Microsoft", vbTextCompare) > 0 Then
       ' Get the product's display version
       oReg.GetStringValue HKLM, strKeyPath & "\" & strProduct, "DisplayVersion", strVersion
       WScript.Echo strDisplayName & vbTab & strVersion
     End If
   Next
   

   Usage:

   cscript //nologo productlist.vbs
   cscript //nologo productlist.vbs > productlist.txt

2. If the software you’re interested in is installed by the Windows Installer, you can get info about that software (such as the name, vendor, version etc) by querying the WMI Win32_Product class. The wmic utility lets you do this directly from the command line and batch files. Here’re some examples:

   • Print the names and versions of installed software:

     wmic product get Name, Version
     

   • List all installed Microsoft products:

     wmic product where "Vendor like '%Microsoft%'" get Name, Version
     

   • List installed products that have Office in their names:

     wmic product where "Name like '%Office%'" get Name, Version
     

   To save the wmic output to a file, you can use the /output and (optionally) /format parameters, e.g.:

   wmic /output:software.txt product get Name, Version
   wmic /output:software.htm product get Name, Version /format:htable
   

   For more information about the wmic syntax, see wmic /?