Aliases in Windows command prompt

Question

I have added notepad++.exe to my Path in Environment variables.

Now in command prompt, notepad++.exe filename.txt opens the filename

Answer 1

If you'd like to enable aliases on per-directory/per-project basis, try the following:

1. First, create a batch file that will look for a file named aliases in the current directory and initialize aliases from it, let’s call it make-aliases.cmd

   @echo off
   if not exist aliases goto:eof
   echo [Loading aliases...]
   for /f "tokens=1* delims=^=" %%i in (aliases) do (
      echo   %%i ^<^=^> %%j
      doskey %%i=%%j
   )
   doskey aliases=doskey /macros
   echo   --------------------
   echo   aliases ^=^> list  all
   echo   alt+F10 ^=^> clear all
   echo [Done]
   

2. Then, create aliases wherever you need them using the following format:

   alias1 = command1
   alias2 = command2
   ...
   

   for example:

   b = nmake
   c = nmake clean
   r = nmake rebuild
   

3. Then, add the location of make-aliases.cmd to your %PATH% variable to make it system-wide or just keep it in a known place.

4. Make it start automatically with cmd.

   • I would definitely advise against using HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Command Processor\AutoRun for this, because some development tools would trigger the autorun script multiple times per session.

   • If you use ConEmu you could go another way and start the script from the startup task (Settings > Startup > Tasks), for example, I created an entry called {MSVC}:

     cmd.exe /k "vcvars64 && make-aliases",

     and then registered it in Explorer context menu via Settings > Integration> with Command: {MSVC} -cur_console:n, so that now I can right-click a folder and launch a VS developer prompt inside it with my aliases loaded automatically, if they happen to be in that folder.

     Without ConEmu, you may just want to create a shortcut to cmd.exe with the corresponding command or simply run make-aliases manually every time.

Should you happen to forget your aliases, use the aliases macro, and if anything goes wrong, just reset the current session by pressing Alt+F10, which is a built-in command in cmd.