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raoulsson
Asked: 2009-12-18 10:06:44 +0800 CST

Is there a global, persistent CMD history?

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Sometimes I forget how the exact syntax of a CMD command looks and then I would like to search my own CMD history. Clearly, within the same session, you can browse it with the up and down arrow keys but what about the history of former CMD sessions? Is there a file, a log the history gets written to or does it all go to digital Nirvana?

Thanks!

windows

10 Answers

  1. Not natively but check out: http://mridgers.github.io/clink/ , makes cmd.exe much more productive. Quoting features from the project page:

    Powerful Bash-like line editing from GNU's Readline library.
Superior path completion (TAB).
Paste from clipboard (Ctrl-V).
Support for the completion of executables/commands, and environment variables.
Undo/Redo (Ctrl-_ or Ctrl-X, Ctrl-U)
Improved command line history.
Persists across sessions.
Searchable (Ctrl-R and Ctrl-S).
History expansion (e.g. !!, !<string>, and !$).
Scriptable completion using Lua.
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  2. Best Answer

    No, Windows command prompt history can't be saved when a session ends.

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  3. Massimo is correct that your command prompt history does not persist across sessions. You could manually grab this before closing your prompt by typing doskey /history > history.txt

    Or... you could use PowerShell as your CMD prompt, and follow this post to persist your history across sessions.

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  4. You can use clink.

    Clink combines the native Windows shell cmd.exe with the powerful command line editing features of the GNU Readline library, which provides rich completion, history, and line-editing capabilities.

    Easiest way to install clink is using chocolatey. Once you install chocolatey, you can install clink by typing

    choco install clink

    Starting from the next time you start cmd.exe, it should store history across sessions.

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  5. It is possible to save the current history to file,

    `$ doskey /history > somefile.txt`

    But it seems there is no way to load it back as history. It is possible only to use a command line argument to load and execute all lines,

    cmd.exe /K somefile.txt

    , what can be useful to load a list of doskey macros. This invocation could be included in a shortcut so you don't need to type it everytime; this reference has some additional info on this approach.

    There is a similar question on Superuser that bring some alternatives, including clink, as suggested by @RobertBak.

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  6. Yes, it's possible

    If all you want to do is save your command line history at the end of every session, here's a simple way to do it:

    As other answers indicated, doskey allows you to list the command line history for the current session. It also allows you to create macros.

    This simple macro will save the command line history when you exit a CMD session:

    doskey exit=(echo/ ^& echo **** %date% %time% ****) $g$g %USERPROFILE%\commands.log ^& doskey /history $g$g %USERPROFILE%\commands.log ^& ECHO Command history saved, exiting ^& exit $*

    This creates a macro that remaps the EXIT command to copy the command line history into your user profile folder (e.g., C:\Users\yourname\commands.log). Unfortunately, you won't be able to easily go back to any of these entries by pressing the up arrow, but you can examine the file at any point to see what you did in the past.

    Autoloading

    So that's the easy part. The tricky part is autoloading that doskey macro when you start a new command session. The short and dangerous answer is to just add it to the REGISTRY in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Command Processor\AutoRun. Anything you put in this entry will be run when you start a CMD session.

    While that will work, it will definitely create unexpected side effects when doing any kind of scripting*.

    So here's how I do it:

    Create a file called autoexec.bat and store it in your profile folder (e.g., C:\Users\yourname\autoexec.bat). Then change the value of HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Command Processor\AutoRun to this:

    IF EXIST "%USERPROFILE%\autoexec.bat" (CALL "%USERPROFILE%\autoexec.bat")

    So yes, this batch file will run every time a CMD session is opened, but we'll do a trick to make sure it doesn't run in any subprocesses. Here is what you put in the autoexec.bat file:

    @echo off
if "%AUTOEXEC%" EQU "1" goto :eof
SET AUTOEXEC=1
echo Loading macros.

rem  remap exit command to save a copy of the command line history to a log before exiting.
DOSKEY exit=(echo/ ^& echo **** %date% %time% ****) $g$g %USERPROFILE%\commands.log ^& doskey /history $g$g %USERPROFILE%\commands.log ^& ECHO Command history saved, exiting ^& exit $*

    How does this avoid those unexpected side effects?

    All we're doing is creating an environment variable called AUTOEXEC. Then, when any subsequent subprocesses open a command session, they will run into the second line and immediately exit the script! This is because subprocesses automatically inherit the environment variables from the parent process.

    But wait, there's more!

    This allows you to add as many macros as you want to your command session. For example:

    rem  review previous command line entries:
DOSKEY history=notepad %USERPROFILE%\commands.log

rem  copy the current directory to the clipboard
DOSKEY cc=cd^|clip ^& echo %%CD%% copied to clipboard

rem  etc!

    Now you've got all the macros you can eat, and you're saving your command line session each time. But remember, if you don't explicitly type exit, the history won't be saved. Closing the window with the mouse won't work here.

    Hope this helps!

    * because batch subprocesses often open a second copy of CMD which will run this command again and again, from slowing everything down to other unforseen issues.

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  7. Command History: To enable a command history (that can be accessed using the up and down arrow keys) just execute doskey at the command prompt. For example, to create a command history of 100 elements:

    doskey /listsize=100

    ref:https://users.cs.jmu.edu/bernstdh/web/common/help/ntshell.php

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  8. clink is nice and the author publishes a chocolatey package on every release, however I would suggest DeepBlueCLI.

    You can use https://github.com/sans-blue-team/DeepBlueCLI to set-up Windows Security Event ID 4688.

    For PowerShell, DeepBlueCLI also uses module logging (PowerShell event 4013) and script block logging (4104). It does not use transcription.

    The added benefit is that it logs the hash of the command line exe in AppLocker event log. Source: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/identity/ad-ds/manage/component-updates/command-line-process-auditing

    Also, because this solution uses the Windows Event Log infrastructure, you can query it through WMI or PowerShell Get-EventLog. With clink, you have to learn another tool in order to detect system- or network-wide patterns of behavior.

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  9. To save command history:

    doskey /history > history.dos

    To reference commands:

    cls & type history.dos | find /v /n ""

    This method won't change the command history of current session

    To add the current session command history to the last save file:

    doskey /history >> history.dos
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  10. Windows 10 now includes alternative and better shells ('terminals' as they call them).

    1. Windows Terminal, i think i installed it via the built in store. Once installed just press start and search for Terminal or do Start>Run>wt. This includes persistent command history.
    2. Ubuntu shell, You can install Windows Subsystem for Linux and Ubuntu, both of these come from the built in store. If you know unix then having access to all the usual bash utilities and syntax is very handy and of course command history is persistent.
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