The CMD.EXE Help System

This online help system for CMD.EXE covers all CMD.EXE features and 
internal commands.  It includes reference information to assist you in 
using CMD.EXE and developing batch files; however it does not include all 
of the details which are included in the printed CMD.EXE manuals. 

If you type part or all of a command on the line and then press F1, the 
help system will provide "context-sensitive" help by using the first word 
on the line as a help topic.  If it's a valid topic, you will see help for 
that topic automatically; if not, you will see the list of all help topics 
and you can pick the one you want. 

You can use this feature to obtain help on any topic -- not just on 
commands.  For example, if you enter the command HELP _DISK you will see 
help for the _DISK internal variable.  See the HELP command for more 
information. 

If you type the name of any internal command at the prompt, followed by a 
slash and a question mark [/?] like this: 

        copy /?

then you will see help for the command in a "quick-reference" style. 
 Output from a /? display may be redirected with > or >>. 

The /? option may not work correctly if you have used an alias to redefine 
how an internal command operates.  To view the /? help for such a command 
you must add an asterisk to the beginning of the command to disable alias 
processing.  For example, if you have defined this alias: 

        alias copy *copy /r

then the command COPY /? will be translated to COPY /R /?, which will not 
work properly.  However, if you use *COPY /?, the alias will be ignored 
and the /? will work as you intended. 

The CMD.EXE help system uses OS/2's VIEW.EXE to display this help text. 
 Once you've started the help system with HELP or F1, you can use VIEW's 
standard keystrokes to navigate.  For more information, click on the Help 
menu at the top of the VIEW window. 

Configuring the Help System 

You can select which help "books" are displayed when you press the F1 key 
or enter the HELP command.  A help book is a single .INF file.  This help 
text is in the file CMD.EXE.INF. 

By default, CMD.EXE opens this book and the OS/2 command reference file, 
CMDREF.INF.  You can change the default books opened for the CMD.EXE help 
system with the HelpBook directive in CMD.INI.  The default setting is 
CMD.EXE+CMDREF.  For example, to load only the CMD.EXE help when you press 
F1 or enter the HELP command: 

        HelpBook = CMD.EXE