Windows CMD.exe "The system cannot find the path specified."

Question

Solved by restoring Windows to previous state

The message (The system cannot find the path specified.) shows...

1) When i open new CMD (Win+R => cmd). It starts with introduction. (on line 3)

Microsoft Windows [Version 6.1.7601]
Copyright (c) 2009 Microsoft Corporation.  All rights reserved.
The system cannot find the path specified.

C:\Users\ViliamKopecky>

2) When i execute some command like cmd /C dir (or cmd /C php -v or whatever) (on line 2)

C:\Users\ViliamKopecky>cmd /C dir
The system cannot find the path specified.
 Volume in drive C is Windows7_OS
 Volume Serial Number is 8230-1246
...

C:\Windows\System32>cmd /C php -v
The system cannot find the path specified.
PHP 5.4.8 (cli) (built: Oct 16 2012 22:30:23)
Copyright (c) 1997-2012 The PHP Group
Zend Engine v2.4.0, Copyright (c) 1998-2012 Zend Technologies

3) (the most annoying) when i run exec function from PHP or Node.js or probably any scripting lang. (which are probably runned from inside as cmd /C <command>)

The message does not show...

1) when i execute the command right from the cmd (or mingw, ...)

C:\Users\ViliamKopecky>dir
 Volume in drive C is Windows7_OS
 Volume Serial Number is 8230-1246

 Directory of C:\Users\ViliamKopecky

---

Let's start with simple command from cmd.

php -r "exec('dir', $stdout, $stderr); print(implode(\"\n\", $stdout), $stderr);"

and the result is like this (the directory test is empty - that is correct):

E:\test>php -r "exec('dir', $stdout, $stderr); print(implode(\"\n\", $stdout), $stderr);"
The system cannot find the path specified.
 Volume in drive E is www
 Volume Serial Number is 0C99-95EC

 Directory of E:\test

09.11.2012  22:42    <DIR>          .
09.11.2012  22:42    <DIR>          ..
               0 File(s)              0 bytes
               2 Dir(s)  13 495 296 000 bytes free
int(1)

Which shows that the command dir has is executed from php correctly. Only thing thats wrong is the second line - The system cannot find the path specified. - that should not be there.

This message is output by exec from PHP (and also from Node.js as require('child_process').exec("dir", function(err, stdout, stderr) {console.log(stderr)});)

When I execute command right from cmd (or mingw, etc.) it executes correctly without the message. Environment variable PATH seem ok. Problem is just executing from script environment through exec functions.

How to get rid of that annoying message? Thanks

Answer 1

The problem is that some program has been set to autorun when you run cmd.exe. In my case it was ANSICON that was installed... and then I moved the file without properly uninstalling.

I found a solution in this blog post:

http://carol-nichols.com/2011/03/17/the-system-cannot-find-the-path-specified/

The short version is to find

HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Command Processor\AutoRun

and clear the value.