NMAKE Help (nmake.hlp) (Table of Contents; Topic list)
Special Characters as Literals
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     The following characters have special meaning for NMAKE:
 
          :  ;  #  (  )  $  ^  \  {  }  !  @  -
 
     To use one of these characters without its special meaning, place
     a caret (^) in front of it. NMAKE ignores carets that precede
     any other characters. A caret within a quoted string is treated as
     a literal caret character.
 
     You can also use a caret at the end of a line to insert a literal
     newline character in a string or macro. The caret tells NMAKE to
     interpret the newline character as part of the macro, not a line
     break. This differs from using a backslash (\) to continue a line
     in a macro definition. A newline character that follows a
     backslash is replaced with a space.
     See: Defining a Macro
          Special Characters in Macros
 
     In a command, a percent symbol (%) has a special meaning. NMAKE
     interprets %s as a filename, and it interprets the characters %|
     followed by d, e, f, p, or F as part or all of a filename or path.
     To represent these characters literally in a command, specify a
     double percent sign (%%) in place of a single one. In all other
     situations, NMAKE interprets a single % literally. However, NMAKE
     always interprets %% as %. Therefore, to represent %%, you can
     specify either %%% or %%%%.
     See: Filename-Parts Syntax
 
     To use the dollar sign ($) as a literal character in a command,
     you must specify two dollar signs ($$); this method can also be
     used in other situations where ^$ also works.
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