Open the Command Prompt for a Specific Target

If you work with typed commands frequently, there are probably times when you'd love to be able to click a folder in Windows Explorer and open a Command Prompt right there, without having to open the Command Prompt to its default location and then issue CD command after CD command to get to the desired location.

Opening a command console from Windows Explorer can be very useful if you have a bunch of command-line utilities stored in a single location. You can use Explorer to navigate to the folder without typing and then open a command window on the target folder with all your utilities. Again, the goal is to save keystrokes where possible. But this option is not enabled by default in Windows Explorer. To add it, follow these steps:

1.	In Windows Explorer, select the Tools | Folder Options and select the File Types tab. Select the "(NONE)" Folder option, and then click the Advanced button in the "Details for 'Folder' file type" section.
2.	From the Edit File type dialog box, select New and type Command Prompt in the Action: entry box.
3.	In the Application used to perform Action: section, type cmd.exe. Click OK twice to save and then exit the Folder Options dialog box.

After this procedure, opening a command window for a specific target folder is a snap. All you have to do is right-click the desired folder in Windows Explorer and choose Command Prompt from the context menu, as you see in Figure 6-5.

Figure 6-5. Open a Command Window from anywhere.

There are other ways to accomplish this as well. The PowerToys utility will install a right-click menu shortcut for Explorer called Open Command Window Here. You can download the XP PowerToys from this location:

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/downloads/powertoys/xppowertoys.mspx