Windows 7 / Getting Started

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Copy

The Copy command can be used to copy files from the command prompt. When the Copy command is used, the original file is not modified and a new file is created. It has the following format:

Copy sourceFile destinationFile

Both the sourceFile and the destinationFile can include a path statement. If the path is omitted, the current path is used. If the file is being copied to a different path, the destinationFile name can be omitted and the name will be the same.

As an example, you can copy a file named test.txt to a file named test2.txt in the current directory with this command:

Copy test.txt test2.txt

If the test.txt file exists in a folder named Docs on the C: drive and you want to copy it to the C:\Data folder keeping the original name, use this command:

Copy C:\docs\test.txt c:\data

You can also use wildcards with Copy commands. For example, if you wanted to copy all of the files from the C:\Data folder to the C:\Archive folder, you could use this command:

Copy C:\data\*.* c:\archive\

As explained earlier, the asterisk (*) wildcard can be used in place of zero or more characters. When you use *.*, it will include all files in the folder.

Similarly, if you were already in the C:\Archive folder, you could use the following command, omitting the destination. All of the files would be copied from the source folder and copied into the current folder.

Copy C:\data\*.*