COMMON DOS COMMANDS SX/DX
To give you more confidence before you start the daunting task of pursuing your DOS user’s manual, we
outline here some of the more common and most basic DOS commands. The operative word here is
“outline”. For full details of all the possible functions with these commands you will have to refer to your
DOS user’s manual or type
HELP (command name)
at the DOS prompt. The commands are divided
into internal and external commands, starting with the former.
Dir – The Directory Command
The DIR command is probably the most common DOS command and you will use it almost every time
you turn on your computer. The DIR command gives you a directory, that is a list, of all the files stored
on a diskette or disk. For example, suppose you have a diskette and you want to know what files are
stored on that diskette, then, to find out, insert the diskette in your floppy disk drive and type DIR, as
below:
A>DIR<Enter>
A list of file names will appear on your screen. Alongside each file name is the size of the file (in bytes)
and the date and time at which that file was last modified.
Beneath the list of files you will also be told how many files are on the diskette and how many free bytes
remain on the diskette or disk. The DIR command can be used for floppy diskettes or hard disk drives.
The DIR command can also be used to find information on one particular file. Suppose you have a file
called LETTER>TXT on your C: drive and you want to see the date on which the file was last modified,
you could type:
A>DIR C:LETTER>TXT<ENTER>
Notice how the C: used to tell DOS to look on the C: drive is placed after the DIR command and before
the file name. In response to such a command you would get a display similar to that shown: [SX/DX
5-6]
Volume in drive C has no label
Directory of C:\
LETTER TXT 2340 5-01-90 4.53p
1 File(s) 320000 bytes free
This tells you that the file LETTER.TXT consists of 2,340 bytes and was last edited at 04.53pm on the
1st of May 1990. You are also told that there are a total of 320,000 free bytes on the hard drive.
If the list of files is very long, the text will continue scrolling off the top of your screen making it
impossible to see the first files in the directory. To pause the scrolling, you need to press < Ctrl> S or <
Ctrl> < Pause>. To restart the scrolling press either of these key combinations again. The DIR command
has various parameters to display the list of files in different formats and you should refer to the DOS
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COMMON DOS COMMANDS SX/DX
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