DOS Command reference

For NT commands see Help for all NT Version 4.0 commands APPEND Locating Application Files. ATTRIB Specifying the Read-only and Archive Attributes BACKUP Backing Up Files between Drives BREAK Checking Whether Break Was Invoked CHCP Changing the Code Page CHDIR Changing the Current Directory CHKDSK Checking Disk Space CLS Clearing the Screen COMMAND Invoking a Second Command Processor COMP Comparing Files COPY Copying Files CTTY Changing to a Remote Terminal DATE Displaying the Current Date DEL Deleting Files ERASE Erasing Files DIR Listing Files in a Directory DISKCOMP Comparing Disks DISKCOPY Copying Disks EXE2BIN Converting .EXE Files to .BIN Files FASTOPEN Storing Recently Opened Files in Memory FDISK Partitioning the Hard Disk FIND Finding Strings Within Files FORMAT Formatting Disks GRAFTABL Loading Graphics Characters GRAPHICS Printing a Graphics Screen JOIN Joining Drives via a Directory KEYB Loading Foreign Keyboards (PC-DOS 3.3 only) KEYBxx Loading Foreign Keyboards LABEL Modifying Volume Labels MKDIR Creating New Subdirectories MODE Setting Device Modes MORE Displaying One Screen at a Time NLSFUNC Selecting Code Pages with CHCP PATH Searching a Specified Path PRINT Printing Files PROMPT Changing the System Prompt RECOVER Recovering Damaged Files RENAME Renaming Files REPLACE Replacing Selected Files RESTORE Restoring Backed-up Files RMDIR Removing Directories SELECT Selecting Keyboard and Date Format When Installing DOS SET Setting Operating Parameters SHARE Loading Support for Network File-Sharing SORT Sorting Text Data SUBST Substituting Drive Designators SYS Copying System Files to Another Disk TIME Displaying the Current Time TREE Displaying Directory Trees TYPE Displaying the File Contents VER Displaying the DOS Version VERIFY Verifying Data VOL Displaying the Disk Volume Name XCOPY Copying Selected Files

Creating a Zero Length File

The old DOS method of creating a zero length file by issing: REM>ZERO.DAT works under Windows 9x but won't work under Windows NT/2000/XP. The command: TYPE ZERO.DAT > ZERO.DAT will work under all versions of Windows and DOS. assuming that ZERO.DAT does not exist before the type command.

Output files from the input file name with a different extension

Lots of batch files require you to supply file name parameters without extension so that an output file can be made with a new extension or they will require the full output file name as a seperate parameter. Automatically providing an output file name with a new extension turns out to be pretty easy: Just make the output file with %1ext and then ren %1ext *.ext where %1 is the full input file name and ext is whatever you want the extension to be. This works in '98, NT and XP.