How to copy a list of file names to text file?

If you are ok with the full file path, hold down shift, right click on your highlighted files/folders, and choose "Copy as path". This will give you the full path of all selected files/folders in the clipboard.

6 Answers 6

It's very, very easy in the Windows Command-Line Interpreter (all Windows OSes):

1. Open a command prompt (Start -> Run -> cmd Enter )
2. Navigate ( cd ) to the directory whose files you want to list.
3. Enter dir >output_file_name (e.g., dir > C:\dir.txt ) and press Enter .

Open the newly created text file ( C:\dir.txt ) and you'll have the complete output of the dir command in that directory.

The greater than symbol ( > ) signifies output redirection; it sends the output from most commands to a file you specify and is very handy for being able to log output from commands.

The output can be controlled with all the various options available for customizing the normal output of the DIR command; just add the output redirection at the end of whatever arguments you want to send that output to the text file.

Update: Creating a right-click context menu for creating directory contents listing

Create a batch file and save it as %windir%\DirList.bat :

@echo off set dirpath=%1 dir %dirpath% /-p /o:gn > "%dirpath%\DirContents.txt" exit 

Open your SendTo directory:

Windows 7/Vista: %appdata%\Microsoft\Windows\SendTo
Windows XP: %USERPROFILE%\SendTo

Create a new shortcut pointing to DirList.bat and call it whatever you please.

Now, right clicking on any directory and selecting the SendTo sub-menu will present your new command for listing directory contents.

NOTE: This will only work when right-clicking on a directory, and it will only list the contents of the directory you right-clicked on. It also saves the list to that directory (to avoid overwriting other files). The script could be easily modified to change where the output list file is stored.