COMMAND

Starts a new instance of the operating system command interpreter.

A command interpreter is a program that lets you type commands. Use EXIT to stop the new command interpreter and return control to the old one.

COMMAND /?

COMMAND [[drive:]path] [device] [/D] [/E:nnnnn] [/F] [/LOW] [/T] [/Z] [[/P [/L:nnnn] [/U:nnn] [/MSG]] [[/Y [/C command | [/K command]]

In your CONFIG.SYS file:

SHELL= [[dos-drive:]dos-path] COMMAND.COM [[drive:]path] [device] [/E:nnnnn] [/F] [/LOW] [[/P [/L:nnnn] [/U:nnn] [/MSG]]

[drive:]path (v2.0 Win95 NT4)

Specifies the directory in which the command interpreter is to look for the COMMAND.COM file when the transient part of the program needs to be reloaded. This parameter must be included when loading COMMAND.COM for the first time if the COMMAND.COM file is not located in the root directory. This parameter is used to set the %COMSPEC% environment variable. For more information, see Transient and Resident Memory in COMMAND--Notes. Specifies the drive location (if other than the current drive) to which you want to change.

device (v2.0 Win95 NT4)

Specifies a different device for command input and output. For more information about this parameter, see the CTTY command.

[dos-drive:]dos-path (v2.0 Win95)

Specifies the location of the COMMAND.COM file.

/? (NTXP)

Display help.

/C command (v2.0 Win95 NT4)

Specifies that the command interpreter is to perform the specified command and then exit. This switch must be the last switch on the command-line.

/D (v5.0)

UNDOCUMENTED Temporarily undoes the /F switch. Type EXIT to return to the auto-fail version of DOS. Use at the DOS prompt or in batch files only.

/E:nnnnn (v2.0 Win95 NT4)

Specifies the initial environment size, where nnnnn is the size in bytes. The value of nnnnn must be in the range 160 (256 beginning with v7.00 and Win95) through 32768. The operating system rounds this number up to a multiple of 16 bytes. The default value is 256.

/F (v3.30)

UNDOCUMENTED Forces a "automatic" FAIL response to the COMMAND floppy disk drive error message: ABORT, RETRY, FAIL?

/K command (v6.0 Win95)

Runs the specified command, program, or batch program and then displays the operating system command prompt. This switch must be the last switch on the COMMAND command-line.

This switch is particularly useful for specifying a startup batch file for the operating system prompt in Windows (much like AUTOEXEC.BAT for the operating system). To do this, open the DOSPRMPT.PIF file using the PIF Editor, and type the /K switch in the Optional Parameters box. It is not recommended to use the /K switch on the SHELL command-line in your CONFIG.SYS file; doing so can cause problems with applications and installation programs that make changes to your AUTOEXEC.BAT file.

/L:nnnn (v7.00 Win95)

Specifies the internal buffers length. The value of nnnn must be in the range 128 through 1024. You must specify the /P switch when you use the /L switch.

/LOW (v7.00 Win95)

Forces resident COMMAND data to be kept in low memory.

/MSG (v6.0 Win95 NT4)

Specifies that all error messages should be stored in memory. Usually, some messages are stored only on disk. This switch is useful only if you are running the operating system from floppy disks. You must specify the /P switch when you use the /MSG switch. For more information about using the /MSG switch, see COMMAND--Notes.

/P (v3.20 Win95 NT4)

Should be used only when COMMAND is used with the SHELL command in the CONFIG.SYS file. The /P switch makes the new copy of the command interpreter permanent. In this case, EXIT cannot be used to stop the command interpreter. If you specify /P, the operating system runs your AUTOEXEC.BAT file before displaying the command prompt. If there is no AUTOEXEC.BAT file in the root directory of the startup drive, the operating system carries out the DATE and TIME commands instead. If you do not have a SHELL command in your CONFIG.SYS file, COMMAND.COM is automatically loaded from the root directory with the /P switch.

/T (v7.00 Win95)

UNDOCUMENTED Forces resident COMMAND data to be kept in low memory.

/U:nnn (v7.00 Win95)

Specifies the input buffer length. The value of nnn must be in the range 128 through 255. You must specify the /P switch when you use the /U switch.

/Y (v6.0 Win95)

Directs COMMAND.COM to step through the batch file specified by the /C or /K switches. This switch is useful for debugging batch files. For example, to step through the TEST.BAT batch file line by line, you would type COMMAND /Y /C TEST. The /Y switch requires either the /C or the /K switch.

/Z (v7.00 Win95)

UNDOCUMENTED Appends errorlevel to external command output.

SHELL command is the preferred method of using COMMAND to permanently increase space for the environment table.

• Changing your terminal device
• Internal commands
• Limits on environment size
• Running multiple command interpreters
• Transient and resident memory
• Using the /MSG switch

If /E:nnnnn is less than 160 or greater than 32768, DOS uses the default value of 256 bytes and displays the message:

Parameter value not in allowed range.

You can specify a different device (such as AUX) for input and output by using the device parameter. For more information about device, see the CTTY command.

When you start a new command interpreter, the operating system creates a new command environment. This new environment is a copy of the parent environment. You can change the new environment without affecting the old one. The default size of the new environment is 256 bytes or the size of the current environment rounded up to the next 16 bytes, whichever is larger. Use the /E switch to override the default size. (Note that the current environment refers to the memory actually being used, not to the environment size specified with the previous /E switch.)

The operating system loads the command interpreter in two parts: the resident part (which is always in memory) and the transient part (at the top of conventional memory). Some programs write over the transient part of COMMAND.COM when they run. When this happens, the resident part must locate the COMMAND.COM file on disk to reload the transient part. The %COMSPEC% environment variable identifies where COMMAND.COM is located on the disk. If %COMSPEC% is set to a floppy disk drive, the operating system might prompt you to insert a disk that contains COMMAND.COM.

If the operating system is loaded in the HMA, a portion of resident COMMAND.COM is also loaded into the HMA, making more conventional memory available for programs.

Usually, the operating system leaves many error messages in the COMMAND.COM file on the disk instead of using memory to store them. When the operating system needs to display one of these messages, the operating system retrieves the message from the disk containing COMMAND.COM.

If you are running the operating system from floppy disks instead of from a hard disk, the operating system cannot retrieve such error messages unless you have the disk containing COMMAND.COM in drive A. If this disk is not present, the operating system displays one of the short messages instead of the full message:

    Parse error
    Extended error

You can make sure the operating system displays complete error messages by using the /MSG switch with COMMAND. This switch forces the operating system to keep these error messages in memory so that they are always available when needed.

Use the /MSG switch with COMMAND if you have a floppy disk system, unless you cannot afford to lose the memory used to store the error messages.

You must also specify the /P switch when you use the /MSG switch.

COMMAND is called a command processor because it reads any commands that you type and processes them.

Some commands are recognized and carried out by COMMAND itself. These commands are considered internal to COMMAND. Other operating system commands are separate programs located on your hard disk, which the operating system loads just like your other programs.

The following operating system commands are implemented by COMMAND:

• BREAK
• CALL
• CHCP
• CHDIR (CD)
• CLS
• COPY
• CTTY
• DATE
• DEL (ERASE)
• DIR
• ECHO
• EXIT
• FOR
• GOTO
• IF
• LOADHIGH (LH)
• MKDIR (MD)
• PATH
• PAUSE
• PROMPT
• REM
• RENAME (REN)
• RMDIR (RD)
• SET
• SHIFT
• TIME
• TYPE
• VERIFY
• VER
• VOL

The following command specifies that the operating system command interpreter is to start a new command interpreter from the current program, run a batch program named MYBAT.BAT, and then return to the first command interpreter:

    COMMAND /C mybat.bat

The following CONFIG.SYS command specifies that COMMAND.COM is located in the DOS directory on drive C:

    SHELL=c:\dos\command.com C:\DOS\ /E:1024

This command directs the operating system to set the %COMSPEC% environment variable to C:\DOS\COMMAND.COM. This command also creates an environment of 1024 bytes for this command interpreter.

The following command starts an instance of COMMAND.COM and runs the MYBATCH.BAT file, stepping through the file command by command:

    COMMAND /Y /C mybatch.bat

none.

External

DOS

v1.0 v1.05 v1.1 v1.11 v1.24 v1.25 v1.85 v2.0 v2.01 v2.05 v2.10 v2.11 v2.11R v2.12 v2.2 v2.25 v3.0 v3.20 v3.05 v3.1 v3.21 v3.25 v3.30 v3.3A v3.3R v3.3T v3.31 v3.40 v4.0 v4.01 v4.01A v5.0 v5.0A v5.00.02 v5.001A v5.01 v5.02 v6.0 v6.10 v6.2 v6.21 v6.22 v6.23 v7.00 v7.0R1 v7.10 v8.00

Windows

Win95 Win98 WinME

Windows NT

NT4 NT2000 NTXP