Talk:Command line completion

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On Windows XP, I'm almost certain that I've run into instances where I type part of a filename, hit [Tab], and have the first filename (in alpha order) completely filled in. Is this just me? [ alerante | “” 19:45, 31 Dec 2004 (UTC) ]

Tab completion has always worked for me in Windows XP. IIRC it worked in Windows 2000 too. Fredrik | talk 23:06, 2 Jan 2005 (UTC)

Contents 1 Command line completion 2 Windows 2000 3 Reason for adding a cleanup tag 4 Reason for context 5 Miracle

[edit] Command line completion

What about URL completion in browsers. This should be Command line completion.

[edit] Windows 2000

Windows 2000 also supports command line completion for files/directories. You may view the registry setting by running "cmd /?" at the command line.

[edit] Reason for adding a cleanup tag

I made some changes to the Windows section and added links to the Microsoft site. Unfortunately that's the only way to avoid silly errors, as Microsoft likes to change the details at every release of its OS (see /f vs. /F:ON, etc.). The reason for adding a cleanup tag, apart from stylistic issues, is that the article begins with a "general" definition of tab completion, then goes on to the Windows cmd feature. However Windows cmd allows to use characters other than TAB (and even have distinct characters for directory name completion and filename completion). Thus that's not (necessarily) a *tab* completion. I thought this could be solved by rewording a bit the contents but now another idea occurs to me: what about a rename to "command prompt auto-completion"? --Gennaro Prota 15:47, 6 April 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Reason for context

The article may not really explain what command line completion is very well to a user without much experience with shells/CLIs and/or programming. I myself consider myself to have a high knowledge of computers and software in general and although I don't use CLIs that much, it took me a while to realise what it was talking about. Perhaps some examples or something would help Nil Einne 09:33, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Miracle

How does the CLI for example know what arguments are allowed to be passed to a program in order to allow even this kind of command line completion? --Abdull (talk) 23:14, 26 January 2008 (UTC)

By context, and making assumptions. The first string on a command would be (normally...) a program name, so the search path for that takes into account where programs can be found (perhaps mixing with the CLI's built-in commands). After that, CLI's would generally assume additional arguments are names of files in the current working directory. Tedickey (talk) 00:03, 27 January 2008 (UTC)