DOS to the rescue

DOS to the rescue

One of the first commands a DOS user was likely to learn was DIR, which generated a listing of files in the current directory (optional parameters could, of course, return listings of other directories). If you're familiar with the DIR command from previous versions of DOS, you'll notice that its output is now a little different, as shown in Figure C. It lists long file names, file sizes, and creation dates.

Figure C

The DIR command's output isn't very useful in its raw form.

Unfortunately, this volume of information is more than you need, and capturing it would result in a heavy editing task. But you can augment the DIR comment with a set of optional switches, as shown below. These switches aren't case sensitive. Click here to see a list of DIR command line switches. For my example, I'll use the /b switch, which simply results in a list of file names, as shown in Figure D. If need be, you can add the /s switch, which lists file names in the current directory and all subdirectories.

Figure D

This output is ideal for capturing file names.

The /s switch is useful even in a directory that has no subdirectories, as it includes the file path in the output (Figure E).

Figure E

It's easy to add the path to your file name output.

Redirection
The DIR command gives you the information you want, but it isn't yet in a form you can use in a Windows document -- you can't copy and paste the contents of the DOS window. Instead, you'll use another native DOS technique: output redirection. Rather than allow the DIR command's output to appear onscreen as it does by default, you'll send it to a text file. To do so, you'll use the > redirection operator, like this:dir /b /s > dirlist.txt
Of course, you can use any file name you like and you can precede it with a file path. When you press [Enter], you'll simply see the command line reappear. However, if you close the DOS session by typing exit and you return to Windows, you'll find a new text file that contains the file names, as shown in Figure F, ready to be copied and pasted into any Windows document.

Figure F

You can't use the DIR command's DOS output, but you can redirect it to a text file that you can use in Windows.

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