A while back I had a manager who liked me to email him the full path to where certain files were located. Even if the same directory was used—over and over—for the same files, he still wanted me to email him the full path. Since Windows XP does not have a right click context menu option to copy a file’s (or folder’s) path, I had to right click, select Properties, select the path displayed in the properties dialog box, copy it, and then finally paste it into the email to my boss. After a while that got annoying, so I wrote this quick little app to make my life… well, less annoying. :) With Fast Path, it’s a simple two step process: right click a file (or folder), select “Copy file (or folder) path”. Done.

Both Vista and Windows 7 have a similar feature already available, but since you have to hold the shift key before you right click in order to get that option, it’s not exactly convenient. This native command also encloses the path with double quotes, which is annoying if you want to do something like paste the path in, say, Windows Explorer. Fast Path eliminates the need to hold the shift key and doesn’t include quotation marks. So even though I’m on Windows 7 these days, I still keep this baby installed.

Fast Path can run on Windows 98 or later, provided it has .NET 2.0 or later installed.