Set path from command line

Users can run an executable from windows command prompt either by giving the absolute path of the file or just by the executable file name. In the latter case, Windows searches for the executable in a list of folders which is configured in environment variables. These environment variables are as below.

1. System path
2. User path

The values of these variables can be checked in system properties( Run sysdm.cpl from Run or computer properties). Initially user specific path environment variable will be empty. Users can add paths of the directories having executables to this variable. Administrators can modify the system path environment variable also.

How to set path from command line?

In Vista, Windows 7 and Windows 8 we can set path from command line using ‘setx’ command.

For example, to add c:\dir1\dir2 to the path variable, we can run the below command.

Alternative way is to use Windows resource kit tools ‘pathman.exe‘. Using this command we can even remove a directory from path variable. See download windows resource kit tools. This works for Windows 7 also.

Add directory to system path environment variable:

Open administrator command prompt
Run the below command

Remove path from system path environment variable:
Run the below command from elevated command prompt

Setting user path environment variable

For user environment varlables, admin privileges are not required. We can run the below command to add a directory to user path environment variable.

To remove a directory from user path, you can run the below command.

Default option is not allowed more than ‘2’ time(s)

You get this error if you have not enclosed ‘path’ in double quotes. See the below example for setting the path of firefox.

Now if you move %path% to be in the double quotes

Could a context entry be created for folders, perhaps an extended one… to add to path?

what about a multi-verb option, like copy as path?

hi, when i use setx at an administrator command line, it creates a USER variable, NOT the SYSTEM variable. What am i doing wrong? How do i change the SYSTEM path at command prompt? -thx

Johny Why
Answer: Try add the parameter /M

Hi, is there a way I can add an extra variable instead on deleting the currently one and put a new Variable on the Path.

I used the command setx /M “c:\Options”, and what it does is delete the current one and then puts that one there, all I want is to add the new variable to the current one. -thx

Nuno, pathman described above does exactly that. You can download the resource tools kit and get it.

setx path “%path%;C:\yourFolder”

To set path for java & javac, can I add the paths to PATH or do I need to create the environment variable JAVA_HOME. I don’t have this defined, but windows does not seem to be able to find java binaries on my system.

You can directly add the folder to PATH. No need to define JAVA_HOME. However, adding JAVA_HOME separately avoids cluttering and helps to easily understand what is added.

hello, can someone plz explain this result? After setting path, it did not change. This was run from an Administrator command-line:

C:\Windows\system32>setx path “C:\Windows\system32;C:\Windows;C:\Windows\System32\Wbem;C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\;C:\ProgramData\chocolatey\bin;D:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft VS Code\bin”

SUCCESS: Specified value was saved.

C:\Windows\system32>path
PATH=C:\Windows\system32;C:\Windows;C:\Windows\System32\Wbem;C:\Windows\System32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\;C:\ProgramData\chocolatey\bin;D:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft VS Code\bin;D:\Program Files (x86)\metapad36;D:\Program Files (x86)\metapad36″ /M

Why won’t this work?

SET EPO = D:\Program Files (x86)\McAfee\ePolicy Orchestrator
PATH = %PATH%;%EPO%\jre\bin;%EPO%\apache2\bin

In windows 10 set path %path%; not working. it’s work like :
setx “%path%;C:\Program Files\CodeBlocks\MinGW\bin”

By unfortunately I deleted my system default path. How could I able to find my system path?

Unfortunately I deleted several files with unremembered path names. This article was useful

The following used to work for me when I am in MSDOS environment. Lately I get error messages such as INCLUDE not found. Why is this so?

Used to work
SET PLL =c:\CL5\PLL
SET PLT =c:\CL5\PLL
SET INCLUDE =c:\CL5\INCLUDE
SET PRG =c:\IMS\PRG
SET LIB =c:\CL5\LIB
SET OBJ =c:\CL5\OBJ
PATH =c:\IMS\EXE;\CL5\BIN;\CL5\NG;\CL5\PLL

pathman is one of many tools of the Windows Server 2003 Resource Kit Tools

Note: The Windows Server 2003 Resource Kit Tools are not supported on 64-bit platforms.

Huh.
When I did that on Windows 10 v1903, using setx, it replaced the USER scope paths with the SYSTEM scope paths.
Now I’m not sure what was in the old user path.
So, uh… Be careful out there.
And if anyone has a solution how to avoid that, please let me know
Thanks

Determine the mapped network path from cmd window

I have a network drive — mapped to Z:\

Is there a simple command to know the full network path from cmd ?

I.e. if cmd shows Z:\ABC\ , I had like a command to output \\networkDrive\MappedDir\ABC

net use is fine but I would like to get the full path of the current working directory (for quick copies).

4 Answers 4

Which will shows you all currently connected network drive.

It’s quite an old question but.. I was looking for the exact same answer as I was trying to create a batch that will use the UNC path to the actual location of the patch and do some things there (so only copy&paste to another location/folder and start again).

As I couldn’t find an answer I found a solution myself, but it’s not very beautiful and certainly not a simple command. But it’s possible to implement in batch. On CMD it would be:

You can copy the four lines (better 4+empty line) and paste them into CMD to get an imidiate echo of the path to copy it.

In batch you would use it a bit differently:

The variable %CD% stores the current path and you need only the drive letter so you only search for that with the FIND command in NET USE. With the «tokens=2» (or 3, depending on NET USE output) the %i variable stores the path to the drive letter you searched for. After that the second SET command adds the folders you browsed on the network drive with %CD:

2% (offset 2 to cut off the drive letter).

For batch you use the %

p0 variables. %0 stores the full path of the batch itself (e. g. Z:\temp\test.bat ; %

p0 = \temp\ ; d = drive, p = path, f = full path, n = name) otherwise it’s similar to the CMD command.

11 networking commands every Windows admin should use

The Windows operating system contains numerous built-in, command line networking utilities. These tools range from the obscure to the commonplace. However, there are 11 built-in networking tools that Windows networking administrators should be familiar with.

I am guessing that the ping command is probably the most familiar, and most widely used of the utilities being discussed in this article, but that does not make it any less essential.

Ping is used to test the ability of one network host to communicate with another. Simply enter the Ping command, followed by the name or the IP address of the destination host. Assuming that there are no network problems or firewalls preventing the ping from completing, the remote host will respond to the ping with four packets. Receiving these packets confirms that a valid and functional network path exists between the two hosts.

NetStat

If you are experiencing problems with network communications, then network statistics can sometimes help point you toward the root cause of the problem. That’s where the aptly named NetStat command comes into play. This command has a number of different functions, but the most useful of these is to display network summary information for the device. To see this type of summary information, just type NetStat -e.

The ARP command corresponds to the Address Resolution Protocol. Although it is easy to think of network communications in terms of IP addressing, packet delivery is ultimately dependent on the Media Access Control (MAC) address of the device’s network adapter. This is where the Address Resolution Protocol comes into play. Its job is to map IP addresses to MAC addresses.

Windows devices maintain an ARP cache, which contains the results of recent ARP queries. You can see the contents of this cache by using the ARP -A command. If you are having problems communicating with one specific host, you can append the remote host’s IP address to the ARP -A command.

NbtStat

As I am sure you probably know, computers that are running a Windows operating system are assigned a computer name. Oftentimes, there is a domain name or a workgroup name that is also assigned to the computer. The computer name is sometimes referred to as the NetBIOS name.

Windows uses several different methods to map NetBIOS names to IP addresses, such as broadcast, LMHost lookup, or even using the nearly extinct method of querying a WINS server.

Of course, NetBIOS over TCP/IP can occasionally break down. The NbtStat command can help you to diagnose and correct such problems. The NbtStat -n command for example, shows the NetBIOS names that are in use by a device. The NbtStat -r command shows how many NetBIOS names the device has been able to resolve recently.

Hostname

The previously discussed NbtStat command can provide you with the host name that has been assigned to a Windows device, if you know which switch to use with the command. However, if you’re just looking for a fast and easy way of verifying a computer’s name, then try using the Hostname command. Typing Hostname at the command prompt returns the local computer name.

Tracert

Contrary to what a rather infamous YouTube video might lead you to believe, Tracert isn’t pronounced “Tracer T,” nor can it show you how many people are using Google right this second. Instead, Tracert, or “Trace Route,” is a utility for examining the path to a remote host.

Functionally, Tracert works similarly to Ping. The major difference is that Tracert sends a series of ICMP echo requests, and the request’s TTL increased by 1 each time. This allows the utility to display the routers through which packets are passing to be identified. When possible, Windows displays the duration and IP address or fully qualified domain name of each hop.

IpConfig

One utility that I find myself using constantly is IPConfig. At its simplest, the IPConfig command will display basic IP address configuration information for the device. Simply type IPConfig at the Windows command prompt, and you will be presented with the IP address, subnet mask, and default gateway that the device is currently using.

If you would like to see more detailed information, then type IPConfig /all. Doing so causes Windows to display IP address configuration that is much more verbose. This is also the command that you will have to use if you want to see which DNS server the Windows device is configured to use.

The IPConfig command can do much more than just display IP address configuration information. It also contains options that can help you to troubleshoot problems related to DNS and DHCP. For example, entering the IPConfig /FlushDNS command purges the contents of the computer’s DNS resolver cache.

NSLookup

NSLookup is a great utility for diagnosing DNS name resolution problems. Just type the NSLookup command, and Windows will display the name and IP address of the device’s default DNS server. From there, you can type host names in an effort to see if the DNS server is able to resolve the specified host name.

Route

IP networks use routing tables to direct packets from one subnet to another. The Windows Route utility allows you to view the device’s routing tables. To do so, simply type Route Print.

The cool thing about the Route command is that it not only shows you the routing table, it lets you make changes. Commands such as Route Add, Route Delete, and Route Change allow you to make routing table modifications on an as needed basis. The changes that you make can be persistent or nonpersistent, depending on whether you use the -P switch.

PathPing

Earlier, I talked about the Ping utility and the Tracert utility, and the similarities between them. As you might have guessed, the PathPing tool is a utility that combines the best aspects of Tracert and Ping.

Entering the PathPing command followed by a host name initiates what looks like a somewhat standard Tracert process. Once this process completes however, the tool takes 300 seconds (five minutes) to gather statistics, and then reports latency and packet loss statistics that are more detailed than those provided by Ping or Tracert.

NetDiag

Perhaps the most useful of the network utilities that are built into Windows is NetDiag. The NetDiag command is designed to run a battery of tests on the computer in order to help the technician figure out why the computer is experiencing networking problems.

One of the things that I really like about this tool is that although there are a number of optional switches that you can use, you don’t have to use any of them unless you want to. Entering the NetDiag command by itself will cause all of the available tests to be run.

In some cases, NetDiag can not only identify problems, but can also fix those problems. Obviously, NetDiag cannot automatically correct every problem that it finds, but appending the /Fix parameter to the command will tell NetDiag to attempt to fix the problem automatically.

The Windows operating system is jam packed with command line utilities. Many of these utilities are left over from operating systems that were introduced decades ago. Even so, the utilities that I have discussed in this article are every bit as useful today as they were when they were first introduced.

How to access a network location in Command Prompt on Windows 10

Dec 19, 2019
Comment

The Command Prompt is one of two stock terminal apps you’ll find on Windows 10. The other is PowerShell and there are quite a few differences between the two. Command Prompt has been around much longer than PowerShell and it stands to reason that more people use it. With Command Prompt, you can move to any directory on your system, and run commands in it. You might run into a slight problem if you’re trying to move to a folder with a space in the name but there’s a simple trick to it.

If you’re trying to access a network location in Command Prompt, the cd command won’t do the job. In fact, the error message that you get might lead you to believe you cannot access a network location in Command Prompt and run commands in it. That isn’t true. You just need to use a different command for the job.

Network location in Command Prompt

When you use the cd command and follow it up with a network location, Command Prompt tells you that ‘CMD does not support UNC paths as current directories’. A quick search will tell you that a UNC path is a path with double slashes or backslashes which is what a network path has.

To move Command Prompt into a network directory, you need to use the pushd command. First, get the complete path to the network location you’d like to access. In the screenshot below, the complete path to the folder that’s open in File Explorer is;

The path is not simply Z:\ which is what you get if you try and copy it from the location bar.

Once you have the path, run the following command. Enclose the path in double-quotes if there is a space in the path.

Syntax

Example

You will notice that Command Prompt allocates a different drive letter to the network location than the one you see in File Explorer. This isn’t anything to worry about.

If you’re wondering how this works in PowerShell, you don’t need to. PowerShell will let you switch to a network location with the cd command.

Syntax

Example

Unlike Command Prompt, PowerShell does not have trouble with UNC paths. If you like, you can just use PowerShell instead of Command Prompt. It is different from Command Prompt but it isn’t less powerful. In fact, you’ll find that in many cases, the above case being a good example, PowerShell is easier to work with.

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.