SECRET MS-DOS COMMANDS

Here is a listing of MS-DOS commands that are not commonly available in help manual or are commonly unknown commands. Many of these commands that are known which can be very useful when using MS-DOS, while some of the other commands are unknown or appear to do nothing.


Caution: Use these commands cautiously, some of the commands can erase data and some without warning.

ATTRIB	The command is short for ATTRIB -a -h -r - s *.* (removes all attributes of a file).
BACKUP /HP	>Unknown
DIR ,	>This lists all files including hidden files, does not work in Windows 95, 98, NT, and 2000.
DIR	>Lists all directories that do not have extensions. In Windows 95 and Windows 98 will list the contents of the directories previous to the directory currently in.
DOSKEY /APPEDIT	>Utilize doskey functions in MS-DOS command utilities such as edlin and debug.
DOSKEY /COMMAND	>Unknown
DOSKEY /PERMANENT	>Unknown
DOSKEY /SCRSIZE	>Unknown
DOSKEY /XHISTORY	>Unknown
FDISK /MBR	>Recreates the Master Boot Record.
FDISK /Q	>Prevents fdisk from booting the system automatically after exiting fdisk.
FDISK /STATUS	>Shows you the current status of your hard drives.
FORMAT /AUTOTEST	>Formats the hard drive without any prompting.
FORMAT /BACKUP	>Like /AUTOTEST but it will ask you for a volume label.
FORMAT /Z:n	>Command used with FDISK supporting FAT32, used to specify the cluster size in bytes where n is multiplied by 512.
MEM /A or /ALL	>Adds a line into the MEM command tells the available space in HMA.
RESTORE /Y	>Unknown
RESTORE /Z	>Unknown
SET DIRCMD=0	>Will make all directories hidden however still accessible, to get them back SET DIRCMD=
SHARE /NC	>Unknown
TRUENAME	>When placed before a file, will display the whole directory that it exists.
VER /R	>Tells you the Revision and if DOS is in HMA.

Posted in: Computer Tricks