Computers Reviews

Automating Things With Batch Files

Automating Things with Batch Files
They Work on Today's Computers Too!

If you're familiar with MS - DOS at all, you'll recall that it's a command - driven operating system that performs functions issued at the C: > prompt. The only system to get an MS - DOS computer to do something was to type a command at this prompt and if you can imagine, corporeal was a rather cumbersome way to call a computer.

As an example, to load up Microsoft's simple editing program, you had to complexion the name of the drive that the program was on, the directory that the fashion was in, and then the name of the program. Therefore if Microsoft Edit was in a directory or folder named " Process, " you could start the program by typing, " C: >process \ make strides. com " Then, and only then would the program accountability up for need.

This is a small command, but just imagine if you had a program that was deeply nested within a series of folder. You could end evolving typing a skill thanks to wide as your computer screen or worse, long enough that the entire command would have to wrap onto the next line! Now imagine having to type these long commands every stint that you necessitous to origin a program. Yikes!

That's one of the reasons why batch files became so popular. Batch files are small text - based documents that contain a bunch of these commands on their confess lines. When executed, they would process each command wandering the user having to type each and every one of them.

When Windows was developed, the need for typing commands was essentially eradicated thanks to the introduction of the point - and - click ( mouse ) interface. But this didn't stop the batch file fever that started under MS - DOS - and in some small circles, batch files are still as accepted as they were in the beginning.

Even though you may use Windows XP or Tableau, batch files can save you tons of time by automatically starting multiple programs and performing different tasks at the single click of a button. They don't require any extensive programming training and they don't need to be encrypted with some weird, expensive compiler. Batch files are average text files, and you can build one for your own personal treatment with Windows' Notepad.

You could make a batch file that loads up your favorite websites at once for example, or you could make a batch file that fills your desktop with the most important applications for the day. To do so only requires a little letters about the locations of these applications.

Let's say that every lifetime we need to load up the Yahoo web browser, Microsoft Word, and then the calculator that comes with Windows. Instead of doing this by hand, we could write a batch file to prepare it for us.

First, we'd load up Notepad and type in the following:

START " http://www.yahoo.com"
START " c: / program files / microsoft metier / office / winword. exe "
Leaving " c: / windows / calc. exe "

We would then save this data into a file named, " mytasks. bat " onto the Desktop for easy access. Each time we double - clicked on this file, the Yahoo website would load up, Microsoft Word would start, and the mild calculator would pop up.

Since we want these programs to load every day, we could create a shortcut to this file and then place the shortcut inside our computer's Start Up folder. That way, these three programs would load every time we turn on the computer. If you wanted these programs to inauguration minimized, you could type the succeeding into a batch file instead:

START http://www.yahoo.com / m
START " c: / program files / microsoft assignment / metier / winword. exe " / m
START " c: / windows / calc. exe " / m

This commit run all three programs as before, however the " / m " parameter will minimize them so that they don't clutter up the desktop.

Other people have found much more creative and effective ways to use batch files, but the important thing is that you know they're a resource you can use to save a few seconds or minutes in performing important tasks. We've come a long way from MS - DOS, but it's still a valuable source of automation that anyone can capitalization with no programming knowledge at all.