Knowing Your Windows Run Commands

On a support call today I was asked “How do I know so many run commands and why”

Knowing your run command is a very fast and easy way too manage and fault find for issues you may be faced with. I personally do not know all commands but I know the ones I need to know and that help me do my job faster and provide resolutions to clients.

The key things I have found along my way is services generally always need a cycle if you make any changes even if they may not it is always good to restart them.

services ( This will provide you a list of all services that are on your server/PC ) Some things I like to do if you are fault finding a service that isn’t starting that should be is sorting by start up type. This will let you see the status of all your services that should start automatically, manually and disabled. If it isn’t started and is set to automatic you have found your service that is causing issues.

Remotely accessing other servers from your services.msc is also a handy tool when you need to restart the services on over 10 servers. Simply click Action and connect to another computer.

eventvwr ( Your local machines Event Viewer )

Some people will have mixed opinions on the amount of information this handy tool can provide if used correctly it can provide you with the answer almost every time something fails on your system.

mstsc /v xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx Terminal Server Connection, RDP (Remote Desktop Protocol)

Options

ConnectionFile     The name of an RDP file for connection

/v:<server[:port]> The remote computer to connect to

/console       Connect to the console of a server (NT/XP)

/Admin         Connect to a session for administering the server(Vista/2008)

/f             Start in Full Screen mode

/w:width       Width of the RDP screen

/h:height      Height of the RDP screen

/span          Match the Remote Desktop width and height with the local virtual

desktop, spanning across multiple monitors if necessary.(Vista/2008)

/public        Run Remote Desktop in public mode. (Vista/2008)

In public mode, passwords and bitmaps are not cached.

/edit          Open the RDP file for editing.

/migrate       Convert a legacy Client connection file into an .RDP file

control ( This shows your control panel )

iexplore ( Internet explorer )

inetmgr ( IIS Manager )

notepad ( Blank Note pad Doc )