Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!sun-barr!apple!bbn!mit-eddie!uw-beaver!tektronix!orca!frip!andrew
From: andrew@frip.WV.TEK.COM (Andrew Klossner)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards
Subject: Re: network filenames
Message-ID: <3620@orca.WV.TEK.COM>
Date: 19 Jun 89 06:20:04 GMT
References: <1989Jun6.000120.14888@eci386.uucp> <216@cbnewsd.ATT.COM> <7095@cbmvax.UUCP>
Sender: nobody@orca.WV.TEK.COM
Organization: Tektronix, Wilsonville, Oregon
Lines: 23

[]

	"If find // to be both concise and from the *users* point of
	view quite indicative of "something special".  It seems that
	only "wizards" get hung up on the point that is normally
	semantically equivalent to / in file names."

No, innocent programs get hung up too.  For example, this shell script
fragment:

	cp input_file $HOME/tmp_file

will, if run by root (with $HOME="/"), expand into:

	cp input_file //tmp_file

and the kernel network code goes off in search of machine "tmp_file".  We
encounter this quite a bit, and have placed several hacks to work
around it (such as setting root's HOME to "/."), but it still bites the
unwary.

  -=- Andrew Klossner   (uunet!tektronix!orca!frip!andrew)      [UUCP]
                        (andrew%frip.wv.tek.com@relay.cs.net)   [ARPA]