I have a folder of .lnk shortcuts to CLI apps in different folders. The shortcut folder is added to PATH, and my PATHEXT contains “.lnk” extension. As a result, I can just type ffplay in my shell, and Windows automatically finds the D:/shortcuts/ffplay.lnk file and runs the ffplay.exe executable it points to.
When I run ffplay from cmd, it works as expected, outputs usage help to my terminal and exits. When I do the same from Powershell (does not matter if the old powershell.exe or new pwsh.exe), there is no stdout output, and a new conhost window with the output appears instead.
Is it possible to make the linked commands behave as normal console program executables do?
How to reproduce:
-
Create a .lnk shortcut to a native command (for example to C:/Windows/System32/PING.EXE), with a different name, so you can run it (so, maybe
D:/shortcuts/lnkping.lnk) -
open
cmd.exe, cd to shortcut directory, run.lnkping.lnk 1.1.1.1, output is inline as normal. Screenshot -
open
powershell.exe, cd to shortcut directory, run.lnkping 1.1.1.1– invocation immediately returns, new conhost window is open and output is displayed there. Screenshot
