Change Command Prompt Default Directory

[MadMaxData]

This is a simple registry hack to change the default directory you see when opening command prompt. I like to have it set to the OS root drive, but you can change it to whatever you like. This will keep you from having to use the "change directory" switch every time you open command prompt, which can be more than a little annoying.

1.) Open up registry editor by typing "regedit" [without the quotes] in the search box, and then clicking on the link up top.

2.) Navigate to the key HKEY_CURRENT_USER \ Software \ Microsoft \ Command Processor and search for the string "Autorun" in the left window. If that string is not existing yet, create it. Double-click it afterwards and add the new directory path in the following way: CD /d C:\

3.) If you would like the command prompt to open in the system32 folder, use this string instead:
CD /d C:\windows\system32

4.) Close the registry editor, and then open the command prompt to check your work.

As you can see, you can easily change the default directory to whatever you like. Hope this helps you from being annoyed at the command prompt.

Here's the rusult....

Max

 

[CommonTater]

This is a simple registry hack to change the default directory you see when opening command prompt.

Hi Max... why would you do that?

In your start bar find the command prompt shortcut, make a copy of it in a convenient place...

Right click and select properties... You will see this....



In the "Start in" box type the path where you want the command prompt to open.
You can even make multiple copies of the shortcut and have them available to open in any convenient place you like...



In addition there are a number of variables that can be used...

%HOMEDRIVE% = the root folder of your system partition
%APPDATA% = the application data folder for each user
%HOMEPATH% = your user folder
%PUBLIC% = your public folder
%SYSTEMROOT% = windows folder
%PROGRAMFILES% = program files folder
%TEMP% = user's temp folder

and I'm sure there are more...

 

[MadMaxData]

Hi Max... why would you do that?

Becuase it's simple, and that's the way I've always done it. Except now I have a .reg file I just double-click on after a clean install. It's among a number of .reg files I use.

 

[CommonTater]

Hi Max... why would you do that?

Becuase it's simple, and that's the way I've always done it. Except now I have a .reg file I just double-click on after a clean install. It's among a number of .reg files I use.

Yeah, well... My way is better...

Hey... whatever works.

 

[Desslok]

Also, if you put whatever paths you need in your PATH environment variable, then that will negate the need to have CMD in a different directory in most cases. It won't really matter what directory it defaults to unless you are specifically trying to do something in that directory.

 

[Brink]

In addition to these great options:

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/27778-open-command-window-here.html

and

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/47415-open-command-window-here-administrator.html

 

[MadMaxData]

In addition to these great options:

http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/47415-open-command-window-here-administrator.html

An easy way to set the Command Prompt to open as Administrator, is to go to Start Orb>>> All Programs>>> Accessories>>> Right click the Command Prompt link>>> Choose Properties>>> Click on Advanced in the Shortcut tab>>> Tick the box to run as Administrator>>> click ok twice to save your setting.

I always run the Command Prompt as Administrator. There's no reason to run it any other way.

 

[Ahven2001]

There is another way to script this into a batch file...

I found this result by google so, sorry for bringing this out of the archive. I thought you all would like this,

To List the working directory, you can call on the environmental variable of %cd%

For example:
If your trying to make a batch file that copyies a file from a "flash drive" to the desktop, you would normally put something like this:

copy e:\filename.txt c:\users\username\desktop /y

The problem would then be that if you plug the flash drive into a machine where the drive letter E: is taken, your copy command would not work. If you use environmental variables your copy command would look something like this.

copy %cd%filename.txt %userprofile%\desktop /y

P.S. keep in mind if you would like to add in a little debugging, add "&&" to specify an action if sucessful OR "||" to specify an action if NOT successful.

For Example the following would copy the file and if it was NOT successful it would ECHO Copying Failed.

copy %cd%filename.txt %userprofile%\desktop /y||ECHO Copying Failed

 

[JohnGray]

I came upon this thread when trying to find how to open, from a desktop icon, a Command Prompt window in a directory of my choosing.

It would seem that the specification of a directory path in the "Start in" field in the shortcut will work only when the Command Prompt shortcut is run in normal, or non-elevated, mode.

However, if the box "Run as administrator" is ticked, the Command Prompt window starts with C:\Windows\System32 as the current directory. It is at this point that one needs to use MadMaxData's original Regedit hack, the first post in this thread, to change this to the directory of one's choosing, say D:\MyDirectory - for which I thank him!

 

[JohnGray]

I came upon this thread when trying to find how to open, from a desktop icon, a Command Prompt window in a directory of my choosing.

It would seem that the specification of a directory path in the "Start in" field in the shortcut will work only when the Command Prompt shortcut is run in normal, or non-elevated, mode.

However, if the box "Run as administrator" is ticked, the Command Prompt window starts with C:\Windows\System32 as the current directory, regardless of whatever directory path has been put in the "Start in" field. It is at this point that one needs to use MadMaxData's original Regedit hack, the first post in this thread, to change this to the directory of one's choosing, say D:\MyDirectory - for which I thank him!

 

[rompl]

JFI: Using this method just to set the initial path when opening a command line window can lead to problems: a colleague of me had strange errors compiling a VisualStudio project which uses a PostBuild-step processing to copy some files using relative paths, and it was very hard to find out this Autorun entry changed the directory before the PostBuild commands were executed, so the relative paths pointed to wrong locations.

 

[UsernameIssues]

Welcome to the Seven Forums, rompl.

Good info - nice first post!

 

[RobinAugy]

I also had problems with this. Due to the default folder being changed, a bat file from certain software I installed was not working anymore. After a long investigation of what went wrong, I found out that the problem was solved when deleting the registry entry again. If I understood it correctly, mostly %d commands will cause problems if you change the default folder.

So be careful with implementing this!