Title: RE: DIR-reading problems
Here's a quick translation of John's message:
From: John Negus
To: Xywrite list
Date: Wed, 25 Sep 2002 10:55:42 +0100
Subject: Re: DIR-reading problems
Further to the problems Xy - in association with Windows - can have with long file and directory names, what look to be short names can actually be long names. I'm not sure of the exact details but if you create a folder or file in Windows 98 (at least), it's likely to be recorded on the disk as a long name, whatever its actual length. The decider may be the case of the characters you enter. Entering it as all capitals gives the highest chance of it being a long name while any lower-case character in the name will almost certainly make it a long name.
Also, I suspect, but haven't verified, that a copy operation under Windows is capable of transforming a short name to a long one.
Xy isn't the only software which is troubled by this. MonsterSoft's own `Label' program in its Dos 6, which is supposed to read and write disk volume names, is unable to do either if there is a long name in the directory. The reason being Windows' stealing of attributes which originally had specific meanings. As Patricia said, every long name is, by its attributes, also read-only, a system file, a hidden file, a volume name - you name it. Programs which relied on the old rules being respected can, under the new regime, find themselves hung.
(The version of a name Windows displays is not necessarily a guide to what's actually on disk: by default it converts an all-caps Dos name to initial cap, rest lower case, though there's an option somewhere (in Folder: | View | Folder Options) to alter this.)
If you create a folder or file in Dos, it will certainly be a short name and all upper case (except for accented characters) - Dos can't handle anything else.
John