XP command line tutorial?

Can someone point me to a command line tutorial for XP? Like, I can't even get to a subdirectory like I could in dos by typing "cd \my_doc~1" . I try "cd \my documents" & I get an error message. I type "help help /p" and I get a message that in effect says the /p doesn't work in this context so I can't just get a page by page display. So a tutorial is in order. & BTW how do you go to a subdir in XP command line? Thanks.

 

I made a pdf out of this for reference. HTH
Johanna

 

Why is there even a command prompt in XP? And for pity's sake there's still an EDIT.COM. I thought XP completely abandoned DOS, but these relics remain.

 

Shadowhawk,
It's always nice to have another way of doing things. Some of the command prompts run utilities that can't be done in the fancy Luna Blue interface, or SHOULDN'T be done by anybody who doesn't know what they are doing! Command prompts are great for troubleshooting, and administering networks. Yes, DOS is dead in XP, but there still has to be ways to do stuff, ya know!

Johanna

 

Johanna ... nice reference!

Larkin ... You may already know this but, if you open a command window (Start > Run > cmd is the easiest way) and enter help, you'll get a list of all the commands available. Enter any of them and add /? (e.g. dir /?) to get the syntax and switches for that command.

So far as I know, you can't just CD to a subdirectory (despite the presence of the CD and CHDIR commands) ... you have to do it within the command, itself, e.g. dir e:\images\miscellaneous.

There is another way, though ... if you have X-Setup installed, open it to Appearance > Files&Folders > Drives, click on DOS prompt here Context Menu, check both boxes, and either click on "Apply Changes" or hit the F9 key. Now, when you right-click on any drive or folder in Windows Explorer and select DOS Prompt Here, a command window will open already CD'd to that drive or folder.

HTH

 

I went to the prompt which starts at C:\DOCUMENTS AND SETTINGS\ADMINISTRATOR and typed CD\ "MY DOCUMENTS" to go to C:\MY DOCUMENTS and then CD\ "DOCUMENTS AND SETTINGS" to go back where I was. So maybe he typed something wrong.

 

No, I typed nothing wrong, Shadow. Both of my XP Pro computers work this way.

 

Well maybe it's configured different, but I can use the CD command with no trouble.

 

larkin,
part of the confusion is the interaction between spaces and quotes... also, using quotes to indicate "this is what I typed" in the posts! so I'll use colour instead
C:\Anywhere> cd \mydocu~1 (no underscore & strictly 8 char)
or
C:\Anywhere> cd \ "my documents "
or
C:\Anywhere> cd "\my documents "
should do the job, but
C:\Anywhere> "cd \my documents " won't work, it'll say "Bad command" or the like... enclosing with quotes like this, the whole thing gets treated as one entity, and the poor command line interpreter will get puzzled.
The first thing on a command line is the command verb - which tells it the action required - things like copy or dir or cd it can understand - but it'll throw a wobbly on cd \my documents because it's not a verb in its vocabulary.

(OK, cd is more tolerant than most command verbs to working even without a space afterwards iff immediately followed by a backslash... it's a bit anomalous. Better to use the space always.) Like:
C:\> copy myfile.txt myfile.bak will work but
C:\> copymyfile.txt myfile.bak clearly won't - the copy has to be kept separate from the myfile.txt ... which is the function of the space.

Only use quotes to hold together parameters which include spaces - to stop them being treated as separate parameters. To stop my documents being treated as my and documents.
hope that's not made it even more confusing!
best wishes, HJ.
edited for clarity and typingf errobs!

 

First, thank you for all the replies! I'm a bit overwhelmed at what I thought would be of little interest, being probably a "duh!" sort of question I thought (sheepishly [baah]?).

Mr. Jarss: I had tried all those variants before posting. After seeing your reply, I tried them again. The first one: "cd \mydocu~1" worked, probably I had tried quotes or wrong spaces yesterday, so thanks. However, none of the other ones you suggested worked, so I still need to view the tutorials (thanks ShadowHawk & Johanna).
As you guessed, I had forgot to mention the e: partition was FAT32 (8 char limit), while the XP sysinstall is NTFS & on another drive entirely (all NTFS). So I should have booted to w9x & checked my 8.3 spelling, instead of assuming that just because wXP printed the full NTFS name, any (suitable) command using the full name would work. And this may be true, especially after I read the stuff y'all advised & see exactly how to word things...

BTW, what triggered this was a download of Firebird 1.5 for win32, where the release note said to do a "mozillafirebird.exe -p" to create a new profile (if you had a previous firebird install in place, & I had such). I presumed I had to do this in the command line, but once there in command line, I couldn't get to the dir where I'd downloaded firebird, so I posted here. And after all that I went ahead with the install from the GUI without being able to get to the dir to do the "-p" edit. It worked fine.

 

Hi Paul,

Firebird 1.5? Curious, as it's only at 0.7+.

Firebird's instructions aren't very clear about how to enter the Profile Manager, but it's quite easy ... Start > Run, and enter the full path to MozillaFirebird.exe, appending it with "-p" (no quotes, of course).

Firebird doesn't need to be installed ... just move the unzipped file to wherever you want it (or unzip it there to begin with) and create a shortcut to MozillaFirebird.exe on your Desktop or on your Start menu.

If you did use the installer version, you should have an icon in Start > Programs > Firebird that will open Profile Manager for you.

Also, BTW, you don't normally need a new profile. Mine is several months old (but needs weeding out and cleaning up ).

 

ooops sorry! I jumped in just going on what you'd put in the original post...
...would be interested to know if
C:\Somewhere> cd \ "My Documents " works OK... sometimes things in quotes get tricky about case...
I could see that "cd \my documents " wouldn't play; and cd \my documents would try to cd to \my, and then probably get confused about the extra documents...
It gets even worse if there's a dot in the middle of the folder name; I've got a folder dial.pipex and that gets 8.3'd to DIAL~1.PIP a folder name with a file extension...
best wishes, HJ.

 

"V. 1.5" ... yes, when you open firebird the about box (& download) say 0.7. But I looked in the version listed in the properties & it sez 1.5.

 

larkin - are you getting the command line from cmd.exe (the proper place /w XP) or command.com?

In fact, try start~run~cmd and see if things work for you.

And FWIW, I imagine My Documents is down a little deeper. Try

cd \documents and settings\<username>\my documents

 

Paul Larkin wrote:

• "'V. 1.5' ... yes, when you open firebird the about box (& download) say 0.7. But I looked in the version listed in the properties & it sez 1.5 "

Truthfully, I've never had any reason to look at the .exe's properties before. Mine says '1.6b: 2003111608', while "About Mozilla Firebird" says "Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.1; en-US; rv:1.6b) Gecko/20031116 Firebird/0.7+ ".