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Introduction

I've created The Familiar because I was tired of remembering complex commands written to cmd or powershell. The Familiar remembers all commands you type, forever*. The history survives reboots and can be shared to multiple machines, which is convenient if you use VMs or need to reset your system often. Warning: The Familiar is in alpha mode. It works - I use it all the time - but it's not polished.

* Technically, it remembers while your files are good.

Installation

1. Install Scoop from https://scoop.sh/

Scoop is a bunch of non-invasive Powershell scripts that helps with installation of command line tools. As of this writing, Scoop is less invasive than Chocolatey and dotnet tool, which explains why I choose that over the others.

After you installed, make sure scoop is in your path.

2. Install The Familiar

Run the following from cmd or powershell:

scoop install https://raw.githubusercontent.com/fernacolo/familiar/master/scoop/fam.json

Then run fam -h to check if the familiar is in the path. If not, close and open the prompt and try again. There should be no need to reboot or change your path.

3. [optional] Connect to a Shared Directory

Let's say you use OneDrive or DropBox. In order to automatically store all your commands there, do this:

md "%OneDrive%\familiar"
fam --connect "%OneDrive%"

Now all commands you write will be stored there. Do this for other machines, and they will all see the same history. You can choose any directory, even a shared folder such as \\myserver\shared\familiar.

4. Use The Familiar

Just run fam and you will see a small window attached to your prompt. Everything you type there will be recorded and executed in the prompt. If you need to type a password or interact with the prompt window directly, just use the mouse to click on the prompt window. Everything you type in the prompt window directly will NOT be recorded by the Familiar.

The Familiar embraces the non-invasion principle. The tool does not change the registry and does not intercept anything in the prompt process. Instead, it attaches to the window and uses Win32 APIs to simulate keystrokes.