Reinventing BAT File Commands, Windows CMD Batch Files, CMD Files, and BAT Files Commands

• Combine the power of the command line with the ease of use of Windows Explorer. Manipulate files at the command prompt and graphically see the results, and drag and drop files into tab windows (even console apps that don't support drag & drop), other applications, or the desktop.
• Take Command is compatible with your existing bat file commands and CMD batch files, while adding thousands of new features.
• The integrated and familiar environment means you are immediately more productive with your interactive command prompt and batch file programming tasks.
• Create and debug your batch files in a fraction of the time with the integrated editor and batch file debugger.
• It's fast - 20-200% faster at displaying command line output than the standard Windows console, saving you time and money.
• Take Command runs your existing Windows BAT files and CMD files faster than CMD.
• The consistent command prompt syntax reduces your learning and development time.
• Speed your development time and reduce syntax errors with the comprehensive help (including context-sensitive popup help for command prompt syntax).
• Take Command is fully customizable, including multiple themes, colors, menus, toolbars, and windows.
• The user interface is available in English, French, German, Italian, Russian, and Spanish. (Online help is currently in English only.)

• You can run multiple Windows command line and GUI applications simultaneously in tabbed windows, including our own Take Command Console (TCC), CMD, bash and PowerShell.
• The integrated file explorer allows you to examine directories and drag and drop files to the tabbed windows.
• Create and debug your Windows cmd files with the integrated graphical IDE. The IDE includes tabbed edit windows and a sophisticated debugger with single stepping, breakpoints, syntax coloring, code folding (for command groups, DO loops, IF blocks, and SWITCH blocks), tooltips, bookmarks, and tabbed variable and watch windows. Windows batch file programming has never been easier or more powerful!
• The scrollback buffer lets you review or print output from past commands, and find text in any tab window (including regular expression searches).
• The programmable toolbar lets you create up to 20 tabs with up to 50 toolbar buttons on each. Toolbar buttons can start new tabs or windows, start batch files, or send commands or text to existing tabbed windows.
• The Take Command scripting language is a massive superset of CMD, with 182 internal commands, 290 internal functions, and 177 system variables. The language includes a complete set of flow control structures including IF-Then-Else, DO and FOR loops, SWITCH statements, subroutines, batch libraries, and more. Almost all of the CMD file commands (e.g. DIR, COPY, DEL, START, etc.) are enhanced with hundreds of additional options. And TCC adds more than 145 new commands. Take Command can usually do in one or two lines what requires dozens of lines in CMD batch files (if it can do it at all).
• Colorize your CMD file commands output with the built-in ANSI x3.64 support.
• You can redefine your commands with aliasing, create new commands and functions for your regular tasks, and assign frequently used commands to a single keystroke.
• Create your own internal user-defined variable functions by combining variables, functions, and commands.
• Environment variable handling is greatly enhanced, including nested variables, delayed expansion, multidimensional array variables, and read / write access to the system, user, and volatile variables in the registry.
• Select or exclude files by date, time, size, owner, description, and extended wildcards or regular expressions for extraordinary flexibility in file management.
• Specify multiple filenames for most file processing commands (i.e., COPY, DIR, MOVE, etc.), or optionally the name of a file that contains the filename arguments. (COPY even supports multiple targets as well as multiple sources.)
• Batch files can send keystrokes to any application (tabbed windows, console or GUI).
• Your bat files can use multiple types of redirection, including redirecting and piping to STDERR, "here-document" and "here-string" redirection, and TEE and Y pipe fittings.
• Browse your command line and directory history, filename and directory completion, and use numerous cut and paste options (even with console applications that have no internal cut and paste support) with the advanced line editor.
• Customize filename completion for any internal or external command or alias. This allows Take Command to intelligently select and display filenames based on the command you are entering.
• The optional input editing window (with full undo / redo) allows you to create and edit commands before sending them to the active tabbed window.
• Take Command includes the best text and binary file viewer available for Windows, including bidirectional scrolling, hex listings, multiple rulers (fixed and/or floating), grid lines, extensive searching and printing features, and much more.
• Find any directory on your system by entering only part of its name with fuzzy directory searches.
• Customize directory displays in your batch files with PDIR ( a programmable DIR command).
• Display floating text (without a window) on your monitor (like TV or monitor setup prompts) with the OSD command.
• Monitor your system's hardware and software events, and execute commands when an event is triggered. You can monitor directory changes, the clipboard, event logs, network connections, services, processes, and USB and Firewire connections.
• Take Command includes internal compression and extraction commands for ZIP, TAR, and GZIP files.
• You can access FTP, TFTP and HTTP (including SSL and SSH) directories and files in all command line file-handling commands (COPY, DEL, MOVE, etc.).
• Send SMPP, SMTP, and SNPP messages from your batch files.
• Query the WMI (Windows Management Interface) to retrieve system configuration information.
• Write your own internal variables and commands with the plugin SDK, or choose from the many third-party plugin libraries.
• Internal support is included for Perl, Ruby, REXX, Python, Tcl/tk, and any Windows Active Scripting language. You can even combine multiple languages in your Windows batch files.
• And many thousands more -- see our online help for more details.

Are you frustrated with the limitations of bat file commands, CMD batch file commands and batch scripting? Do you yearn for a real scripting language and an integrated IDE and batch debugger?

Batch files in Windows are text files that contain one or more commands, and have a .bat or .cmd filename extension. Windows batch files, which are also called bat files, cmd files, or batch scripts, allow you to simplify and automate routine or repetitive system administration tasks.

Most internal command shell commands or external applications can be used either at the command prompt or in a CMD batch file. (There are a few exceptions, such as CALL and GOTO, which are only meaningful in batch files.)

Once created (typically with a text editor like Notepad), batch files can be executed as if they were executable programs. When you type the file name at the command prompt, the Windows command processor runs the commands sequentially as they appear in the file. Bat file commands can be either internal command processor commands (like COPY or DEL), or external applications (console or GUI). You can pass arguments ("batch parameters") to your script by entering them on the command line following the batch file name. You can even run a batch file inside other batch files.

The program that runs batch files in Windows is the CMD command processor (also called the command shell). Unfortunately, the Windows command shell has been seriously lacking in even the most basic features compared to the shells available in other operating systems such as Linux (which has bash, tcsh, zsh, etc.). And CMD batch files haven't changed significantly since their first appearance in Windows NT 3.1 in 1993. Because of the limitations inherent in CMD batch files, users have often been forced to use the GUI for inappropriate tasks, or to write programs (for example, using C++ or VB) to perform simple tasks that the CMD file commands should be able to handle.

Even worse, creating CMD batch files in Windows has always been tedious and usually painful for any non-trivial scripts. Windows provides very little support for creating CMD files, and none at all for debugging them. Most developers, system administrators and advanced users have been resigned to using the crude and inefficient (or nonexistent!) tools in Windows when creating and debugging batch files.

But creating and debugging your CMD files doesn’t have to be aggravating. Take Command is the ideal solution to your batch file woes. With over 20 years of offering command line and batch files solutions, JP Software has perfected Windows batch scripting tools that are easy to use, customizable, and well supported (via our extensive online documentation and active support forums). Take Command is a complete CMD replacement that provides you with a vastly better UI, an IDE for creating bat files, and thousands of other features that are not available in CMD bat files (or even in those Linux shells).

In addition, Take Command is a powerful programming tool for your batch files, offering powerful extensions such as DO loops, If / Then / Else, SWITCH, subroutines, error and exception handling, an integrated IDE editor and a sophisticated batch debugger, third-party plugins, and over 460 built-in variables and functions. Creating batch files is easier, more efficient and less tedious (with tools to debug and automate your processes and scripts). Windows batch file programming has never been more painless and more powerful!

Windows treats BAT files and CMD files the same. The command processor will open the batch file, read one line, close the batch file, execute the line, open the batch file, read the next line, close the batch file, execute the line, etc. There is a third extension type BTM that can only be used in Take Command, which runs faster than BAT files or CMD files. A BTM file is opened, the entire file read into memory, and closed. Take Command then runs the batch files from memory. And unlike a BAT file or CMD file, a BTM file can also optionally be compressed and encrypted, which can be useful in a corporate environment where you do not want the end users to modify batch files.

Does it all sound too good to be true? Let us prove it -- download the fully-functional 30-day free trial, or order risk-free with our unconditional 90-day money-back guarantee.