bevan@cs.man.ac.uk (Stephen J Bevan) (11/28/90)
Are there any ASCII based OSs that allow you to create filenames that contain the ASCII character NUL? For example a file called :- stupid@file where `@' represents the NUL character. UNIX (SunOS 4.1 actually) seems to allow most other characters in the name e.g. a space, but I can't get it to accept a NUL. I am not really suprised by this given UNIX is implemented in C. Is there any system that does allow NUL in the name? If you know of one, could you (send me)/post details of how the file is created (e.g. shell script, fragment of C, ADA, BLISS, ... etc.) If the system has a C compiler, how does it react when you try and open the file using fopen? i.e. does it open it correctly (that would be bizarre) or does it try to open a file called `stupid'. Ta Stephen J. Bevan bevan@cs.man.ac.uk
slsw2@cc.usu.edu (11/30/90)
In article <BEVAN.90Nov27203337@panda.cs.man.ac.uk>, bevan@cs.man.ac.uk (Stephen J Bevan) writes: > Are there any ASCII based OSs that allow you to create filenames that > contain the ASCII character NUL? Well, it's not ASCII, but OS/8 has an interesting mechanism for doing that sort of thing. In place of a file name you could type '#' followed by a digit string that specified the file name in octal (6-bit chars = 2 digits per char). That way you could build file names that had spaces on the front or what have you. -- =============================================================================== Roger Ivie 35 S 300 W Logan, Ut. 84321 (801) 752-8633 ===============================================================================
harley@irisa.fr (Jon Harley) (12/01/90)
In article <BEVAN.90Nov27203337@panda.cs.man.ac.uk> bevan@cs.man.ac.uk (Stephen J Bevan) writes: >Are there any ASCII based OSs that allow you to create filenames that >contain the ASCII character NUL? >[...] >Is there any system that does allow NUL in the name? If you know of >one, could you (send me)/post details of how the file is created (e.g. >shell script, fragment of C, ADA, BLISS, ... etc.) >Stephen J. Bevan bevan@cs.man.ac.uk Honeywell multics (RIP), at least v 11, let you. You just typed \000 and NUL was inserted (you could insert any ascii character by giving a 3 digit octal code in this way). You could also create directories called "<" (which means to multics what "../" means to unix), which confused the hell out of the accounting software! Ah... the good old days, of wombat.forum at bham.multics... Jon. -- __________________________________ / --Jonathan Harley smile! :-) / "Le plaisir // // // / *temporarily working in France* / de comprendre"... // // ////// /_______E-MAIL: harley @ irisa.fr /_________________________//////////// //
lennox@minilove.diag.stratus.com (Craig Scott Lennox) (12/01/90)
In article <BEVAN.90Nov27203337@panda.cs.man.ac.uk> bevan@cs.man.ac.uk (Stephen J Bevan) writes: UNIX (SunOS 4.1 actually) seems to allow most other characters in the name e.g. a space, but I can't get it to accept a NUL. The reason you can't is that NUL is used by the UNIX kernel to terminate a filename. Craig. -- | flame me at: lennox@minilove.diag.stratus.com, (Craig Scott Lennox) | |"Oh boy, virtual memory! Now I'm gonna make myself a REALLY BIG ram disk!" | | Disclaimer: My opinions are covered by section 2b of the Gnu Public | | License and thus do not belong to Stratus Computer. |
new@ee.udel.edu (Darren New) (12/01/90)
In article <BEVAN.90Nov27203337@panda.cs.man.ac.uk>, bevan@cs.man.ac.uk (Stephen J Bevan) writes: > Are there any ASCII based OSs that allow you to create filenames that > contain the ASCII character NUL? AmigaDOS, at the lowest filesystem interface, uses counted strings for the file name, so I imagine it would be possible to put NULs in a name. My question is "Why do you ask?" -- Darren -- --- Darren New --- Grad Student --- CIS --- Univ. of Delaware --- ----- Network Protocols, Graphics, Programming Languages, Formal Description Techniques (esp. Estelle), Coffee, Amigas ----- =+=+=+ Let GROPE be an N-tuple where ... +=+=+=
kris@beep.UUCP (Kris Muss) (12/01/90)
In article <BEVAN.90Nov27203337@panda.cs.man.ac.uk>, bevan@cs.man.ac.uk (Stephen J Bevan) writes: >Are there any ASCII based OSs that allow you to create filenames that >contain the ASCII character NUL? I don't know about NULs, but here at beep files can be created with backspaces in them; i.e. this<BS><BS>at This would show up on a 'ls' as "that". The backspaces can be seen by doing "ls | cat -v". To remove such a file by name, you would have to type in the backspaces (as expected). I found one of these in beep and it was a b*tch to remove because I had forgotten just WHERE in the file name the backspaces were. -- Port'naybl key!beep!kris -OR- woodowl!beep!kris "For men without women are like fish without water to swim in; Was (Not Was) their eyes bugging out, they flop on the beach "Shadow & Jimmy" and stare up at the girls who are just out of reach."
cs202101@umbc5.umbc.edu (cs202101) (12/05/90)
In article <1990Nov29.143756.43331@cc.usu.edu> slsw2@cc.usu.edu writes: >In article <BEVAN.90Nov27203337@panda.cs.man.ac.uk>, bevan@cs.man.ac.uk (Stephen J Bevan) writes: >> Are there any ASCII based OSs that allow you to create filenames that >> contain the ASCII character NUL? You can do this on IBM PC's running MS-DOS; all you need to do is hold down the Alt key and enter the number 255. This will allow you to have blanks in a file name (the extended ASCII char #255 is a blank). Robert Douglas Davis # Is reality real? Can you prove it? cs202101@umbc5.umbc.edu # Can you write an algorythm to prove it? Home: +1-301-744-7964 # Do you have a computer fast enough to compute it? BBS: +1-301-788-6663 # ---> REAL Education: The Benny Hill Show!