Xref: utzoo news.software.b:3306 comp.unix.xenix:8159
Newsgroups: news.software.b,comp.unix.xenix
Path: utzoo!henry
From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: B News' Directory permission problem in /tmp
Message-ID: <1989Oct23.152647.27702@utzoo.uucp>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
References: <8910220254.AA05389@decwrl.dec.com> <37127@looking.on.ca>
Date: Mon, 23 Oct 89 15:26:47 GMT

In article <37127@looking.on.ca> brad@looking.on.ca (Brad Templeton) writes:
>Unix 3.2 is POSIX compliant.  That means that if you pass a filename longer
>than 14 chars, it is not truncated, the open fails.

It should be noted that "POSIX compliant" does not suffice as an explanation
for this particular behavior.  This behavior is *optional* in POSIX; the
alternative is the way Unix historically did it, i.e. just ignore the extra
characters.  That is, blame AT&T, not POSIX, for this decision.
-- 
A bit of tolerance is worth a  |     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
megabyte of flaming.           | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu