Windows XP: Command Line

The book is easy to follow and the hands-on exercies really help solidify the concepts in your head. HUGE book - how many pounds does this thing weigh? A must-read for those who've never used DOS but want to learn.

Im not sure if this is the best command line book.. but i love it. It full of many commands and has a full layout of what each does. Im not new at command prompt and not a god at it either.. so its great to have this as a reference when i need something to happen over my network. Im very satisfied with this book and id recommend it to anyone. The CD that comes with it is strange thow. It must be for practiceing, cause its full of useless knowlegde text files. i havent found a use for it yet, but maybe im over looking something.

This book is easy to follow. It will help you get a feel for MS DOS, it is for the true beginner of DOS. It is not for the seasoned DOS expert, cause it is too simple. I was a true beginner at DOS, used this book for an independent "command line" class at college. Do not let the colorless text fool you. While not "pretty" like other books, it has some good knowledge to be had. I had much success with it. This book has one huge drawback - As you go thru the exercises, altering files, moving files to other directories, and so forth, each chapter depends on what you did in the previous one. If you mess up bad enough and do not have a backup of your work, you will get into a mess. You HAVE to go thru this book in sequence for things to work right. Take all instructions and warnings serious. Be careful with what you learn tho, and heed the authors warnings, cause thru DOS, it is easy to wipe out tons of files on any drive with a few simple keystrokes. You will "know enough to get into trouble" with certain things. NEVER experiment with DELETE commands (DEL) while on your hard drive if you are not sure what you are doing.

After having read the review of Oscar Lagunas I hesitated a bit buying this book but finally I have bought it although and I'm very happy having done it. If you have like me never worked with MS-DOS and you want to learn the command line I find this is a perfect book specially if you have to do it by yourself. If I have a criticism about the book it is that it explaines sometimes things (which I find quit evident) to mutch in details. But maybe even this is good because it is written at a very basic level for somebody who doesn't know anything about the computer. With the book ships a floppy disk which is used to learn the first steps and the examples in the book are taken from it so everything on your screen is exactly like in the book.

I took the class, was very impressed with the class, the book, and its contents.Altough it is written for XP Pro, it was a great help in understanding, and using XP Home.I keep it nearby to refresh points that arise, that I do not use often.To me it was well worth the investment.