From DOS command line under Win98
 
   command.com /cecho test
   command.com /cecho "test"

returns
   test
   "test"

as expected.

However a small ruby (Windows Installshield version V1.61) script:

   print `command.com /cecho test`
   print `command.com /cecho "test"`

returns
   test

The second command.com spawn never happens!! 
Same results using system().

Any help would be appreciated... 

PS. My production application is actually spawning
command line zip testing using long filenames 
containing embedded spaces, so these have to be quoted... 

  eg: unzip -t "A long filename.zip".