Command line tool to dump Windows DLL version?

Question

I need a command line tool to dump standard Windows DLL version info so I can process it by means of a bash script (Cygwin).

As a Java developer I am not very used to Microsoft development tools (though I have a little bit of experience with Microsoft Visual Embedded C++ 4.0 and Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0).

The appropriate tool seems to be mt.exe, as stated on SO. However the only chance I have found to get this little application is to download a 1.29 GB ISO of the Windows SDK for Windows Server 2008 and .NET Framework. I can not believe this is the only way to do it.

I have also found a little application on the Internet called PEView, but it displays too much (and useless in my case) information and it is not a command line application.

Standard objdump bundled inside Cygwin can also dump some information about the DLL files, but I can not see the option to dump DLL version. Note that MajorImageVersion, MinorImageVersion and other fields dumped by this tool (with -p option) are not related to own DLL version.

Any alternatives about what to do? Maybe I missed some important objdump option? Is mt.exe my only choice? If this is the case, is it possible to get it separately from Windows SDK?

Answer 1

and one way with makecab:

; @echo off
;;goto :end_help
;;setlocal DsiableDelayedExpansion
;;;
;;;
;;; fileinf /l list of full file paths separated with ;
;;; fileinf /f text file with a list of files to be processed ( one on each line )
;;; fileinf /? prints the help
;;;
;;:end_help

; REM Creating a Newline variable (the two blank lines are required!)
; set NLM=^


; set NL=^^^%NLM%%NLM%^%NLM%%NLM%
; if "%~1" equ "/?" type "%~f0" | find ";;;" | find /v "find" && exit /b 0
; if "%~2" equ "" type "%~f0" | find ";;;" | find /v "find" && exit /b 0
; setlocal enableDelayedExpansion
; if "%~1" equ "/l" (
;  set "_files=%~2"
;  echo !_files:;=%NL%!>"%TEMP%\file.paths"
;  set _process_file="%TEMP%\file.paths"
;  goto :get_info
; )

; if "%~1" equ "/f" if exist "%~2" (
;  set _process_file="%~2"
;  goto :get_info
; )

; echo incorect parameters & exit /b 1
; :get_info
; set "file_info="

; makecab /d InfFileName=%TEMP%\file.inf /d "DiskDirectory1=%TEMP%" /f "%~f0"  /f %_process_file% /v0>nul

; for /f "usebackq skip=4 delims=" %%f in ("%TEMP%\file.inf") do (
;  set "file_info=%%f"
;  echo !file_info:,=%nl%!
; )

; endlocal
;endlocal
; del /q /f %TEMP%\file.inf 2>nul
; del /q /f %TEMP%\file.path 2>nul
; exit /b 0

.set DoNotCopyFiles=on
.set DestinationDir=;
.set RptFileName=nul
.set InfFooter=;
.set InfHeader=;
.Set ChecksumWidth=8
.Set InfDiskLineFormat=;
.Set Cabinet=off
.Set Compress=off
.Set GenerateInf=ON
.Set InfDiskHeader=;
.Set InfFileHeader=;
.set InfCabinetHeader=;
.Set InfFileLineFormat=",file:*file*,date:*date*,size:*size*,csum:*csum*,time:*time*,vern:*ver*,vers:*vers*,lang:*lang*"

example output (it has a string version which is a small addition to wmic method :) ):

c:> fileinfo.bat /l C:\install.exe
    file:install.exe
    date:11/07/07
    size:562688
    csum:380ef239
    time:07:03:18a
    vern:9.0.21022.8
    vers:9.0.21022.8 built by: RTM
    lang:1033

and one more Using shell.application and hybrid batch\jscript.Here's tooptipInfo.bat :

@if (@X)==(@Y) @end /* JScript comment
    @echo off

    rem :: the first argument is the script name as it will be used for proper help message
    cscript //E:JScript //nologo "%~f0" %*

    exit /b %errorlevel%

@if (@X)==(@Y) @end JScript comment */

////// 
FSOObj = new ActiveXObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject");
var ARGS = WScript.Arguments;
if (ARGS.Length < 1 ) {
 WScript.Echo("No file passed");
 WScript.Quit(1);
}
var filename=ARGS.Item(0);
var objShell=new ActiveXObject("Shell.Application");
/////


//fso
ExistsItem = function (path) {
    return FSOObj.FolderExists(path)||FSOObj.FileExists(path);
}

getFullPath = function (path) {
    return FSOObj.GetAbsolutePathName(path);
}
//

//paths
getParent = function(path){
    var splitted=path.split("\\");
    var result="";
    for (var s=0;s<splitted.length-1;s++){
        if (s==0) {
            result=splitted[s];
        } else {
            result=result+"\\"+splitted[s];
        }
    }
    return result;
}


getName = function(path){
    var splitted=path.split("\\");
    return splitted[splitted.length-1];
}
//

function main(){
    if (!ExistsItem(filename)) {
        WScript.Echo(filename + " does not exist");
        WScript.Quit(2);
    }
    var fullFilename=getFullPath(filename);
    var namespace=getParent(fullFilename);
    var name=getName(fullFilename);
    var objFolder=objShell.NameSpace(namespace);
    var objItem=objFolder.ParseName(name);
    //https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/bb787870(v=vs.85).aspx
    WScript.Echo(fullFilename + " : ");
    WScript.Echo(objFolder.GetDetailsOf(objItem,-1));

}

main();

used against cmd.exe :

C:\Windows\System32\cmd.exe :
File description: Windows Command Processor
Company: Microsoft Corporation
File version: 6.3.9600.16384
Date created: ?22-?Aug-?13 ??13:03
Size: 347 KB

Answer 2

There is an command line application called "ShowVer" at CodeProject:

ShowVer.exe command-line VERSIONINFO display program

As usual the application comes with an exe and the source code (VisualC++ 6).

Out outputs all the meta data available:

On a German Win7 system the output for user32.dll is like this:

VERSIONINFO for file "C:\Windows\system32\user32.dll":  (type:0)
  Signature:       feef04bd
  StrucVersion:    1.0
  FileVersion:     6.1.7601.17514
  ProductVersion:  6.1.7601.17514
  FileFlagsMask:   0x3f
  FileFlags:       0
  FileOS:          VOS_NT_WINDOWS32
  FileType:        VFT_DLL
  FileDate:        0.0
 LangID: 040704B0
  CompanyName       : Microsoft Corporation
  FileDescription   : Multi-User Windows USER API Client DLL
  FileVersion       : 6.1.7601.17514 (win7sp1_rtm.101119-1850)
  InternalName      : user32
  LegalCopyright    : ® Microsoft Corporation. Alle Rechte vorbehalten.
  OriginalFilename  : user32
  ProductName       : Betriebssystem Microsoft« Windows«
  ProductVersion    : 6.1.7601.17514
 Translation: 040704b0

Answer 3

Use Microsoft Sysinternals Sigcheck. This sample outputs just the version:

sigcheck -q -n foo.dll

Unpacked sigcheck.exe is only 228 KB.

Answer 4

You can write a VBScript script to get the file version info:

VersionInfo.vbs

set args = WScript.Arguments
Set fso = CreateObject("Scripting.FileSystemObject")
WScript.Echo fso.GetFileVersion(args(0))
Wscript.Quit

You can call this from the command line like this:

cscript //nologo VersionInfo.vbs C:\Path\To\MyFile.dll

Answer 5

You can use PowerShell to get the information you want.

(Get-Item C:\Path\To\MyFile.dll).VersionInfo

By default this will display ProductVersion and FileVersion But the full VERSIONINFO is available. I.e. to return Comments

(Get-Item C:\Path\To\MyFile.dll).VersionInfo.Comments

Answer 6

C:\>wmic datafile where name="C:\\Windows\\System32\\kernel32.dll" get version
Version
6.1.7601.18229