GetCurrentDirectory function (winbase.h)

Retrieves the current directory for the current process.

Syntax

Parameters

The length of the buffer for the current directory string, in TCHARs. The buffer length must include room for a terminating null character.

A pointer to the buffer that receives the current directory string. This null-terminated string specifies the absolute path to the current directory.

To determine the required buffer size, set this parameter to NULL and the nBufferLength parameter to 0.

Return value

If the function succeeds, the return value specifies the number of characters that are written to the buffer, not including the terminating null character.

If the function fails, the return value is zero. To get extended error information, call GetLastError.

If the buffer that is pointed to by lpBuffer is not large enough, the return value specifies the required size of the buffer, in characters, including the null-terminating character.

Remarks

Each process has a single current directory that consists of two parts:

• A disk designator that is either a drive letter followed by a colon, or a server name followed by a share name (\\servername\sharename)
• A directory on the disk designator

To set the current directory, use the SetCurrentDirectory function.

Multithreaded applications and shared library code should not use the
GetCurrentDirectory function and should avoid using relative path names. The current directory state written by the SetCurrentDirectory function is stored as a global variable in each process, therefore multithreaded applications cannot reliably use this value without possible data corruption from other threads that may also be reading or setting this value. This limitation also applies to the SetCurrentDirectory and GetFullPathName functions. The exception being when the application is guaranteed to be running in a single thread, for example parsing file names from the command line argument string in the main thread prior to creating any additional threads. Using relative path names in multithreaded applications or shared library code can yield unpredictable results and is not supported.

In WindowsВ 8 and Windows ServerВ 2012, this function is supported by the following technologies.

How can I return to the previous directory in windows command prompt?

I often want to return to the previous directory I was just in in cmd.exe, but windows does not have the «cd -» functionality of Unix. Also typing cd ../../.. is a lot of typing.

Is there a faster way to go up several directory levels?

And ideally return back afterwards?

4 Answers 4

On Windows CMD, I got used to using pushd and popd . Before changing directory I use pushd . to put the current directory on the stack, and then I use cd to move elsewhere. You can run pushd as often as you like, each time the specified directory goes on the stack. You can then CD to whatever directory, or directories , that you want. It does not matter how many times you run CD. When ready to return , I use popd to return to whatever directory is on top of the stack. This is suitable for simple use cases and is handy, as long as you remember to push a directory on the stack before using CD.

Run cmd.exe using the /k switch and a starting batch file that invokes doskey to use an enhanced versions of the cd command.

Here is a simple batch file to change directories to the first parameter (%1) passed in, and to remember the initial directory by calling pushd %1.

md_autoruns.cmd:

We will also need a small helper batch file to remember the directory changes and to ignore changes to the same directory:

mycd.bat:

And a small aliases file showing what to do to make it all work:

aliases:

Now you can go up a directory level by typing ..

Add another . for each level you want to go up.

When you want to go back, type cd — and you will be back where you started.

Aliases to jump to directories like wk or tools (shown above) swiftly take you from location to location, are easy to create, and can really help if you work in the command line frequently.

Windows shell command to get the full path to the current directory?

Is there a Windows command line command that I can use to get the full path to the current working directory?

Also, how can I store this path inside a variable used in a batch file?

14 Answers 14

Use cd with no arguments if you’re using the shell directly, or %cd% if you want to use it in a batch file (it behaves like an environment variable).

You can set a batch/environment variable as follows:

sample screenshot from a Windows 7 x64 cmd.exe.

Update: if you do a SET var = %cd% instead of SET var=%cd% , below is what happens. Thanks to jeb.

Quote the Windows help for the set command ( set /? ):

Note the %CD% — expands to the current directory string. part.

This has always worked for me:

For Windows we can use

command is there.

For Windows, cd by itself will show you the current working directory.

For UNIX and workalike systems, pwd will perform the same task. You can also use the $PWD shell variable under some shells. I am not sure if Windows supports getting the current working directory via a shell variable or not.

On Windows:

CHDIR Displays the name of or changes the current directory.

In Linux:

PWD Displays the name of current directory.

Based on the follow up question (store the data in a variable) in the comments to the chdir post I’m betting he wants to store the current path to restore it after changeing directories.

The original user should look at «pushd», which changes directory and pushes the current one onto a stack that can be restored with a «popd». On any modern Windows cmd shell that is the way to go when making batch files.

If you really need to grab the current path then modern cmd shells also have a %CD% variable that you can easily stuff away in another variable for reference.

What is the current directory in a batch file?

I want to create a few batch files to automate a program.

My question is when I create the batch file, what is the current directory? Is it the directory where the file is located or is it the same directory that appears in the command prompt, or something else?

9 Answers 9

From within your batch file:

dp0 refers to the full path to the batch file’s directory (static)
%

f0 both refer to the full path to the batch directory and file name (static).

dp0 will always give the full path to the executing batch file. – dbenham Jun 12 ’13 at 11:19

dp0 gives the full path to the directory that the executing batch file is in. %

dpnx0 (which is equivalent to %

f0) gives the full path to the batch file. See robvanderwoude.com/parameters.php for more details. – deadlydog Jul 11 ’13 at 20:08

dp0 is the working directory not the batch files directory, Found this out the hard way. – trampster Jan 29 ’18 at 22:44

dp0 gives the batch file directory with trailing slash. – icc97 Feb 27 ’18 at 9:10

It usually is the directory from which the batch file is started, but if you start the batch file from a shortcut, a different starting directory could be given. Also, when you’r in cmd, and your current directory is c:\dir3 , you can still start the batch file using c:\dir1\dir2\batch.bat in which case, the current directory will be c:\dir3 .

In a batch file, %cd% is the most commonly used command for the current directory, although you can set your own variable:

So say you were wanting to open Myprog.exe. If it was in the same folder, you would use the command:

That would open Myprog from the current folder.

The other option is to make a directory in C: called AutomatePrograms. Then, you transfer your files to that folder then you can open them using the following command:

dp0 is more consistent. – icc97 Feb 27 ’18 at 9:14

Say you were opening a file in your current directory. The command would be:

I hope I answered your question.

It is the directory from where you run the command to execute your batch file.

As mentioned in the above answers you can add the below command to your script to verify:

It is the directory from where you start the batch file. E.g. if your batch is in c:\dir1\dir2 and you do cd c:\dir3 , then run the batch, the current directory will be c:\dir3 .

Just my 2 cents. The following command fails if called from batch file (Windows 7) placed on pendrive:

But this does the job:

dp0 – Ammar Mohammad Aug 3 ’19 at 12:49

%__CD__% , %CD% , %=C:%

There’s also another dynamic variable %__CD__% which points to the current directory but alike %CD% it has a backslash at the end. This can be useful if you want to append files to the current directory.

With %=C:% %=D:% you can access the last accessed directory for the corresponding drive. If the variable is not defined you haven’t accessed the drive on the current cmd session.

Print current directory using Perl

I have this code to print the current directory using Perl:

But it is displaying the filename of my script along with the directory.

I want it only to display C:\Perl\ .

How can I do it?

7 Answers 7

Each of the following snippets get the script’s directory, which is not the same as the current directory. It’s not clear which one you want.

To get the current working directory ( pwd on many systems), you could use cwd() instead of abs_path :

Or abs_path without an argument:

See the Cwd docs for details.

To get the directory your perl file is in from outside of the directory:

See the File::Basename docs for more details.

Just remove the ‘$0’

But I think it doesn’t work on Windows.

Here is one simple solution:

I hope this will help.

You could use FindBin :

FindBin is a standard module that is installed when you install Perl. To get a list of the standard pragmatics and modules, see perldoc perlmodlib .

I used my script in dirs with symlinks. The script parses the path and executes commands depending on the path. I was faced with the correct determination of the current path.

Here is example:

Cwd module disclosures path (analogue of readlink -f) http://perldoc.perl.org/Cwd.html

If you need to get current path like pwd, you can use $ENV

Not the answer you’re looking for? Browse other questions tagged perl directory or ask your own question.

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