Dir (command)

Although syntax, semantics and implementations vary, a dir command with essentially the same functionality is available in the operating systems: CP/M, MP/M, ISIS-II, iRMX 86, CDOS, TRIPOS, DOS, 4690 OS, OS/2, Windows, Singularity, ROM-DOS, ReactOS, GNU, AROS, VMS, RT-11, RSX-11, OS/8, 86-DOS, MS-DOS (in versions 1 and later), and DOSBox.

Some applications also provide a dir command with similar functionality. The typical File Transfer Protocol (FTP) command-line client provides a dir command for listing a remote directory. The numerical computing environments MATLAB and GNU Octave include a dir command.

Generally, Unix-like systems use the ls command for the needs that dir satisfies in other types of systems. Notably, the Unix-like GNU operating system, provides a dir command that is equivalent to ls -C -b; that is, by default files are listed in columns, sorted vertically, and special characters are represented by backslash escape sequences.

List all files and directories in the working directory.

C:\Users>dir

List text and batch files of the working directory by specifying filename extensions ".txt" or ".bat" with the "*" wildcard character that matches any base file name.

C:\Users>dir *.txt *.bat

List files and directories in the specified directory and any subdirectories, recursively, in wide format, pausing after each screen of output. The directory name is enclosed in double-quotes, to prevent it from being interpreted is as two separate command-line options because it contains a space.

C:\Users>dir /s /w /p "C:\Users\johndoe\My Documents"

List any NTFS junction points:

C:\Users>dir /ash Volume in drive C is OS. Volume Serial Number is xxxx-xxxx Directory of C:\Users 12/07/2019 02:30 AM <SYMLINKD> All Users [C:\ProgramData] 12/07/2019 02:30 AM <JUNCTION> Default User [C:\Users\Default] 12/07/2019 02:12 AM 174 desktop.ini 1 File(s) 174 bytes 2 Dir(s) 332,659,789,824 bytes free