The Windows batch shell, commonly referred to as cmd, cmd.exe or the command prompt

Batch specific details:

• variables are enclosed by % signs (e.g. %CI_DIR%)
• NUL is the batch equivalent to the UNIX /dev/null
• the rem keyword is a way to comment out code

Windows PowerShell is a scripting engine .DLL that's embedded into multiple hosts. The most common hosts you'll start are the interactive command-line powershell.exe and the Interactive Scripting Environment powershell_ise.exe.

Powershell is the modern Windows command prompt. Usage is similar to cmd, but with a few key differences. Some UNIX commands are also supported, such as ls.

Powershell specific details:

• system set environment variables must have a $env: prefix. Sometimes, variables must also be enclosed by quotation marks to properly function
• out-null is the Powershell variant of NUl or /dev/null
• to call a cmd script from Powershell use: cmd /c “insert script or command here”

Setting environment variables like PATH can be done via Control Panel → System: