If you ever wanted to copy the full path of any file or folder to the clipboard but without installing any third-party utilities or making any changes to your Windows registry, here’s a tip for you.

Copy the File’s Location to the Clipboard

Open Windows Explorer and navigate to the file or folder whose path you want to copy to the clipboard. Once you are there, hold the “Shift” key and right click that file or folder’s icon.

Because the Shift key is down, the contextual menu will have a new item that says “Copy as Path” – select that and the full location of the file or the folder will get saved to your clipboard from where you can paste it anywhere including the DOS window.

You can use this tip to copy a file’s location from all places including those appearing in the desktop search results.

This trick works in Windows Vista and Windows 7 but not XP. It was originally published in Ed Bott’s book - Windows 7 Inside Out – from where the TechNet Magazine picked it up.

Also see: Copy Command Line Output to the Clipboard