The Open Command Prompt Shell Extension adds an "Open Command Prompt" menu item to the context menus (right-click menus) in Windows Explorer so that you can open a command prompt in the selected directory (or directories) or in the current directory that you are viewing.

The Open Command Prompt Shell Extension is very lightweight (only 16 KiB installed!), supports network paths, is available in multiple languages, and is open-source.

The Open Command Prompt Shell Extension was created primarily to address the shortcomings of the Open Command Window Here PowerToy. Improvements include:

1. The ability to open a command prompt in the directory that you are currently in by right-clicking on any empty screen space in the directory. This eliminates the need to navigate up a level in order to open a command prompt in the current directory.
2. Support for opening command prompts with UNC paths (directories on network shares).
3. Support for multiple languages.

Note: If you already have the Open Command Window Here PowerToy installed, you should uninstall it before installing the Open Command Prompt Shell Extension.

The Open Command Prompt Shell Extension offers these improvements over BackgroundCMD:

1. All-in-one functionality: BackgroundCMD only opens command prompts for the current directory, so in order to open a command prompt for a subdirectory, it had to be combined the Open Command Window Here PowerToy.
2. Support for Unicode paths.
3. Much smaller size: The final installed size is only 16 KiB, and this was achieved without any PE packing!

The Open Command Prompt Shell Extension was designed primarily for users of Windows 2000, Windows XP, and Windows 2003. While this extension has been tested on and does work with Windows Vista, Windows Vista offers a similar built-in feature. There are, however, some differences:

1. The built-in context menu options in Windows Vista only appears if the SHIFT key is held down while right-clicking. If you want this menu option to be available without holding down SHIFT, you will need to use this extension. To avoid the duplication of menu options, this extension will be automatically disabled when you SHIFT-right-click in Windows Vista (this does not affect versions of Windows prior to Vista).
2. The "Open Command Window Here" feature in Windows Vista handles UNC paths using the pushd command, which creates a temporary mapped drive. There are various advantages (e.g., fewer quirks and errors) and disadvantages (e.g., inability to navigate up) to using pushd.

Yes! The Open Command Prompt Shell Extension is open-source, licensed under a BSD-style license.

English, German, French, Spanish, and Chinese (both variants) are supported. More can be added if people submit translations. Please refer to the CmdOpenTranslations.rc file in the source code for more information.

The download link can be found at the top of this page. Download, unzip, and run the installer found inside (CmdOpenInstall.exe). The source code is included in the download package.

Note: If you already have the Open Command Window Here PowerToy installed, you should uninstall it before installing the Open Command Prompt Shell Extension.

(For advanced users) To invoke the installer in silent mode, run "CmdOpenInstall.exe /Q /R:N", and to extract the files without installing, run "CmdOpenInstall.exe /C".

After much deliberation, "Open Command Prompt" was chosen over the more common "Open Command Window Here" as the menu text for this extension. First, while the command prompt is referred to as the "command prompt" all throughout Windows, the Open Command Window Here PowerToy oddly decided to call it a "command window", leading an inconsistency in nomenclature. Second, the "Here" used in the PowerToy is redundant, since it is implied; after all, the other built-in menu items are "Open", "Explore" and "Search", not "Open Here", "Explore Here", and "Search Here". Finally, "Open Command Prompt" is shorter and does not stretch out the context menu as much.

• 2007/08/31 - 1.0.3
  • Installation and uninstallation can now be invoked via standard DllInstall calls.
  • Improved the installer.
• 2007/08/21 - 1.0.2
  • Improved error checking.
• 2007/08/13 - 1.0.1
  • Added German, Spanish, and Traditional Chinese translations.
• 2007/08/08 - 1.0.0
  • Initial version.