Windows.XP.in.a.Nutshell.1002005.2Ed [Electronic resources] نسخه متنی

2.9. The Command Line

Many of those who are new to computers will never have heard of the

command line, also known as the command
prompt or the Disk Operating System (DOS) prompt. (DOS was the
operating system used by most PCs before Windows became ubiquitous.
The command line in DOS was the only way to start programs and manage
files.) Those who might have used older PCs may remember the command
line, but may be under the impression that it's
purely a thing of the past. Advanced users, on the other hand,
whether they remember the old days of the DOS command line or not,
have probably learned the advantages of the command-line interface,
even when using Windows XP on a day-to-day basis.

Many tasks can be performed more quickly by typing one or more
commands into the command prompt window. In addition, many of the
programs listed in Chapter 4 are command-line
based tools, and some familiarity with the command prompt is
necessary if you plan to use them.

For full documentation on the command line and the

Command
Prompt application, see Chapter 6. Also, see
Chapter 3 for information on the Address Bar
and Start Run, two
alternatives to the Command Prompt window.

Here are a few examples that show how the


command
line can be used as an alternative to the GUI:

• To create a
  folder called
  sample in the root directory of your
  hard disk, and then copy all the files from another folder into the
  new folder, for example, it can be quicker and easier to type:

  C:\>mkdir \sample
  C:\>copy d:\stuff\*.* \sample

  than it would to open Windows Explorer, navigate to your
  d:\stuff folder, select all the files, click
  File Copy (or Ctrl-C),
  navigate to the new location, click New
  Folder, type the folder
  name, open the new folder; and then click Edit
  Paste (or Ctrl-V) to copy
  in the files. That's a heck of a sentence, and a
  heck of a lot of steps for what can be accomplished with the two
  simple commands shown above.

• Once you learn the actual filename of a
  program rather than its Start
  menu shortcut name (as described in Chapter 4),
  it's almost always quicker to start it from the Run
  prompt or the Address Bar (see below) than it is to
  navigate the Start menu hierarchy. Which is really easier? Clicking
  your way through four menus:

  Start Programs
  Accessories
  System Tools
  Character Map

  or typing:

  charmap

  into the Run prompt or Address Bar and pressing the Enter key? Typing
  a command is much faster than carefully dragging the mouse through
  cascading menus, where an unintentional slip of the mouse can get you
  somewhere entirely different than you planned.

• Finally, many useful programs don't appear on any
  menu in the Start menu. Once you know what you're
  doing, you can put shortcuts to such programs in the Start menu or on
  the Desktopbut once you know what you're
  doing, you might just find it easier to type the program name.