MS-DOS was first released in 1981 and was the dominant operating system for personal computers until the mid-1990s. It provided basic file management and program execution capabilities through command line commands. Some key commands included DIR to list files, COPY to copy files, DEL to delete files, EDIT to edit text files, and CD to change directories. MS-DOS also supported wildcards, file attributes, path names, and other features to help users organize and manage files and folders through the command prompt.

1. Basic MS-DOS

2. History
MS-DOS 1.0 was released in August 1981,
and was updated until April 1994 when it was
replaced by Windows 95
All versions of windows still contain some type
of DOS, in windows 95 and 98 you can go to
run and type command to get to DOS prompt,
in NT, 2000, and XP you can type CMD and
get DOS.

3. Introduction
The role of DOS is to interpret commands that
the user enters via the keyboard.
These commands allow the following tasks to be
executed:
file and folder management
disk upgrades
hardware configuration
memory optimization
program execution

4. File Manipulation
DIR - Lists files and subdirectories
· Wildcard Characters ? *
EDIT - creates a new file or modifies an existing file
COPY - copies a file or a group of files
XCOPY - copies all files in a directory (and its subdirectories)
DEL or ERASE - deletes a file or a group of files
UNDELETE - undeletes files
COPY (or XCOPY) plus DEL - moves files
DOSKEY - recalls commands
RENAME or REN - renames files
TYPE - displays text files
PRINT - prints a text file
COPY - used to create a file
ATTRIB - sets file properties
FC - compares two files

5. Directory Manipulation
MD or MKDIR - creates a directory
CD or CHDIR - changes directory
PROMPT - changes the command prompt
TREE - displays the directory structure
RD or RMDIR - removes a directory
REN - Renaming directories
PATH - creates a search path

6. Basic Structure
Most DOS commands use the same structure
 Command Source Destination /Switch
The switch will give options to the command
Example COPY A:file.txt c: /v
/v will verify if the file copied correctly

7. The Help Switch /?
You can use the help switch with any
command. It will give you the command
structure, and the availible switches.

8. MS-DOS Prompt
The prompt in MS-DOS displays your
current directory
C:doscommands> means you are in
that directory, and any command you
use will apply to the current directory
unless you specify a different one.

9. DOS Naming
Characters like * + = | [ ] : ; “ <
> , ? / cannot be used in DOS
names.

10. Relative and Absolute path
Alternatively referred to as the file path and full path,
the absolute path contains the root directory and all
other subdirectories that contain a file or folder.
absolute path
C:Windowscalc.exe
Windows non absolute path (relative path)
calc.exe

11. Wildcard characters
Wildcard character will replace a single letter,
or word with a wild character
* will replace any amput of characters, and ?
Will replace one.
Example: copy a:/*.txt c:/ will copy all text files
to drive c:/
Example 2: copy a:/?????.txt c:/ will copy any
5 letter text file to c:/

12. Basic Commands CD
CD- Change directory
You use this command when you want
to change the directory.
Example: CD C:DOS will bring you to
the dos folder

13. Basic Commands CD.. And CD
CD.. - brings you to the previous
directory.
Example: if you are in C:DOSFOLDER
CD.. Will bring you to C:DOS

14. Basic Commands CLS
CLS Will clear the contents of the screen

15. Basic Commands DIR
DIR will display the contents of the folder

16. Basic Commands COPY
COPY will copy the file from one location
to another
Example COPY A:file.txt c: will copy
the file from a: to c:

17. Basic Command XCOPY
XCOPY can move files, directories, and
whole drives from one location to
another, It is more powerful then the
copy command, and has a lot of
switches.

18. Basic Commands MOVE
MOVE will move the file or directory
from one location to another
Example: MOVE a:file.txt c:file.txt will
move the file to the c: drive

19. Basic Command DEL
DEL will delete a file or an empty
directory from the drive

20. Basic Command EDIT
EDIT will open a text file

21. Basic Commands REN
REN will rename the file
Example : REN file.txt myfile.txt will
rename the file.txt to myfile.txt

22. Basic Commands MD/RD
MD is used to make a directory (folder)
in MS-DOS.
Example: MD myfolder will make a folder
called myfolder in current directory
RD is used for remove directory

23. Deleting folders and sub folders

24. Basic Command TREE
TREE shows you all of the folders and
files in current directory like explorer in
windows.

25. Attributes
Attributes are the properties of a file
such as hidden, read-only, archive or
system file.
In MS-DOS you can view/change
attributes with the attrib command.
Example: attrib +r file.txt will make the
file read-only.

26. The MORE Command

27. The PRINT Command
The PRINT Command in MS DOS is
used to print the text files
Syntax :
PRINT Filename
E.g.
PRINT File1.txt

28. The PROMPT Command
The PROMPT is used to configure a
DOS prompt into our linking
Syntax :
C: PROMPT Promptname
E.g.
PROMPT NCIT
Now, the Prompt will be as NCIT

29. Checking the Date/Time
For checking the date from the system in MS
DOS, we use the DATE command. It returns
the current system date.
Similarly, the TIME command returns the
current time from the system.
Syntax :
 C:>DATE
E.g. C:>DATE

30. Removing unwanted Files
command line.
Go to Run –> cmd. This should open the command
prompt.
Type g: where g is the USB drive letter.
Now run the following command: attrib -h -r -s -a *.*.
This will remove the attributes hidden, archive,
system from all the files.
Type del autorun.inf. This will delete the autorun.inf
file.

32. F:>edit test.txt
F:>edit test.txt
F:>copy con 123.docx
my name is indika rathninda^Z
1 file(s) copied.
F:>edit 123.docx
F:>dir>1234.txt

36. Batch file
DOS, OS/2, and Windows, a batch file is a
type of script file, a text file containing a
series of commands to be executed by the
command line interpreter. A batch file may
contain any command the interpreter accepts
interactively at the command prompt.

37. The Old New Thing
The command processor CMD.EXE comes with a mini-calculator
that can perform simple arithmetic on 32-bit
signed integers:
C:>set /a 2+2 4
C:>set /a 2*(9/2) 8
C:>set /a (2*9)/2 9
C:>set /a "31>>2" 7
Note that we had to quote the shift operator since it
would otherwise be misinterpreted as a "redirect stdout
and append" operator.
For more information, type set /? at the command
prompt.

38. Concatenating Files Together in MS-DOS
Say you have two files (or twenty) named textfile1.txt and
textfile2.txt.
You want to create a new text file that combines the two.
While you could open each file up in your favorite editor
and copy and paste the text, this is time consuming and error
prone. A much easier way to accomplish this task is to use
the copy command:
>copy *.txt result.txt
This will take all the files with the extension .txt and
create a new text file called result.txt out of all of them.

39. Finding Text Inside Files in MS-DOS
Lets assume I have a group of text files and I need to
find out quickly which one contains the string
"Test" inside it. You can quickly accomplish this using
the 'find' command like so:
>find "Test" *.txt
This will search the contents of all the
text files in the current directory and return
a list of all of them that contain the string "Test".
This command is extremely useful for searching text files.