Understanding the CMD prompts

[MetalSpark128]

Good evening at the time that I am writing this I am following through a VM Lab for the A+ cert course in my home town I am familiar w/ most things computer but have neglected the programing aspect of PC. the problem I am facing at this time is understanding why things are being added that are not in the directory (the "help" sheet that pops up when your in the cmd window). Anyways i understand some of it like /s /h are for showing the hidden files, etc; 

 

xcopy c:\drivename\* l:\data\ /s /e /y . 

 

the line above is the one I am trying to understand better I comprehend that I wont become knowledgeable of this type of system overnight but i believe that reaching out to this community would be helpful in getting me there i understand that it copies data/files/etc to a folder and saves it in the "l" drive in this case, i simply dont understand where the system pulled the /s /e /y from or what they stand for individually when being used under other commands anyways please let me know if you have seen this before or know/understand the concept behind this stuff I am just trying to get knowledgable.

[Oshino Shinobu]

These are all switches that can be used with the xcopy command. 

 

/s = Copies folders and subfolders except empty ones

/e = Copies any subfolder, even if it is empty

/y = Overwrites existing files without prompting you

 

https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/help/289483/switches-that-you-can-use-with-xcopy-and-xcopy32-commands

 

EDIT: also, the * in the command is used as a wildcard, so that command would copy everything from c:\drivename\, including all folders, subfolders, even if they're empty and will overwrite any files in the destination without a prompt. 

 

The switch /s is redundant in this command though, as /e does everything /s does, but also copies empty subfolders. 

[Samfisher]

Here you go

 

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/administration/windows-commands/xcopy

[MetalSpark128]

39 minutes ago, Samfisher said:

Here you go

 

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-server/administration/windows-commands/xcopy

I have seen this in my search for answers haha, while i appreciate it i dont understand the why behind the coding maybe i need to rethink my question haha thank you though i will deff save it and look up more information

[Samfisher]

2 minutes ago, MetalSpark128 said:

I have seen this in my search for answers haha, while i appreciate it i dont understand the why behind the coding maybe i need to rethink my question haha thank you though i will deff save it and look up more information

What do you mean by why?  Each flag has a corresponding function

[MetalSpark128]

1 hour ago, Oshino Shinobu said:

These are all switches that can be used with the xcopy command. 

 

/s = Copies folders and subfolders except empty ones

/e = Copies any subfolder, even if it is empty

/y = Overwrites existing files without prompting you

 

https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/help/289483/switches-that-you-can-use-with-xcopy-and-xcopy32-commands

 

EDIT: also, the * in the command is used as a wildcard, so that command would copy everything from c:\drivename\, including all folders, subfolders, even if they're empty and will overwrite any files in the destination without a prompt. 

 

The switch /s is redundant in this command though, as /e does everything /s does, but also copies empty subfolders. 

thank you this explains it a bit better than the website thanks for the link