Command line instructions on Windows

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The Windows command line is one of the most powerful utilities on a Windows PC. With it, you can interact with the OS directly and do a lot of things not available in the graphical user interface (GUI).

In this article, I’ll show you the commands you can use on the Windows command line that can boost your confidence as a Windows user.

Windows Command Line Commands

Press Windows and R to open a Run window and type cmd inside the search bar.

1 – Run the Command Prompt as an Administrator

Entering this command opens another command prompt window as an administrator:

powershell start cmd -v runAs

2 – Lists All Installed Drivers

It is important to have access to all drivers because they often cause problems.

That’s what this command does – it shows you even the drivers you won’t find in the device manager.

driverquery

3 – Changes the Current Working Directory to the Specified Directory

cd "Directory name"

Exit the specified directory

cd ..

4 – Shows Your PC’s Details

If you want to see more detailed information about your system you won’t see in the GUI, this is the command for you.

systeminfo

5 – Copies an Item to the Clipboard

For example, dir | clip copies all the content of the present working directory to the clipboard.

You can type clip /? and hit ENTER to see how to use it.

6 – Lists Programs and the Extensions They are Associated With

assoc

7 – Changes the Command Prompt Window Title Using the Format

title

8 – Shows Open Ports, their IP Addresses and States

netstat -an

9 – Shows a Website IP Address, Lets you Know How Long it Takes to Transmit Data and a Get Response

ping

10 – Changes the Text Color of the Command Prompt

Enter color attr to see the colors you can change to:

color attr

Entering color 2 changes the color of the terminal to green:

11 – Shows Information about PC IP Addresses and Connections

ipconfig

12 – System File Checker

sfc

This command scans your computer for corrupt files and repairs them. The extension of the command you can use to run a scan is /scannow

13 – Logs on to a Website from the Command Line

start website-address

14 – Shows the Tree of the Current Directory or Specified Drive

tree

15 – Shows the Version of the OS

ver

16 – Shows Open Programs

tasklist

17 – Terminates a Running Task

taskkill

To kill a task, run taskkill /IM "task.exe" /F. For example, taskkill /IM "chrome.exe" /F

18 – Shows and Changes the Current Date

date

19 – Shows and Changes the Current Time

time

20 – Shows the Serial Number and Label Info of the Current Drive

vol

21 – Creates a Folder

mkdir my-folder

The folder has been created successfully, you can check it with the dir command

 

 

22 – Deletes a Folder’

rmdir my-folder

 

23 – Moves a File or Folder to a Specified Folder

move

 

24 – Renames a File or Folder with the Syntax

ren

25 – Closes the Command Line

exit

26 – Restart

Restart your computer.

shutdown /r

Conclusion

This article we showed you several “unknown-to-many” commands you can use to get access to hidden functionalities on your Windows PC.

Hopefully this article will be useful for you. Good luck !

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