How do I run a batch file from my Java Application?

Sometimes the thread execution process time is higher than JVM thread waiting process time, it use to happen when the process you're invoking takes some time to be processed, use the waitFor() command as follows:

try{    
    Process p = Runtime.getRuntime().exec("file location here, don't forget using / instead of \\ to make it interoperable");
    p.waitFor();

}catch( IOException ex ){
    //Validate the case the file can't be accesed (not enought permissions)

}catch( InterruptedException ex ){
    //Validate the case the process is being stopped by some external situation     

}

This way the JVM will stop until the process you're invoking is done before it continue with the thread execution stack.

Runtime runtime = Runtime.getRuntime();
try {
    Process p1 = runtime.exec("cmd /c start D:\\temp\\a.bat");
    InputStream is = p1.getInputStream();
    int i = 0;
    while( (i = is.read() ) != -1) {
        System.out.print((char)i);
    }
} catch(IOException ioException) {
    System.out.println(ioException.getMessage() );
}

Batch files are not an executable. They need an application to run them (i.e. cmd).

On UNIX, the script file has shebang (#!) at the start of a file to specify the program that executes it. Double-clicking in Windows is performed by Windows Explorer. CreateProcess does not know anything about that.

Runtime.
   getRuntime().
   exec("cmd /c start \"\" build.bat");

Note: With the start \"\" command, a separate command window will be opened with a blank title and any output from the batch file will be displayed there. It should also work with just `cmd /c build.bat", in which case the output can be read from the sub-process in Java if desired.