Re: back on topic: incorrect directories in XP

[jax jxz@xxxxxxxx]

Bill Troop wrote:
>
> >In the Properties for those "other directories", remove the archive
> >Attribute.
>
> That works just as you said it would. Can you tell me, or point me
> where to get more information on this issue?

I suspect that the archive bit applied originally to files more than
folders. Dos's filing services set it each time a file was modified
while Dos's backup program reset it each time it backed the file up.
The bit's role in folder names was/is probably undefined. (These didn't
exist when the system was designed.)

The problem is one of imperfect specification and implementation in
early and later Doses. If Xy's dir command excludes names having
attributes in addition to the directory one, it's acting logically. In
practice, though, directories have additional attributes. (And if they
have them, they got them from the dos service which created them.)

The attribute problem in general becomes acute in Windows' long
filenames. These distinguish themselves from their lesser brethren by
using space which was available but unused and arrogating themselves a
whole panoply of attributes - volume name, system file, hidden file,
read-only - none of which apply. (Dos's own volume label program can't
correctly read a volume name which has long filenames alongside it in
the directory.)

In actual practice, there is space available in a directory for
additional attributes - like a long-file-name one for instance. But of
course M$ couldn't introduce them because the effect on existing
programs wouldn't have been predictable.

When the original Dos filing system came out, there was no such thing as
a directory. That got grafted on more or less successfully, but the
original design is beginning to show its limitations.

John

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