Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!helios!photon!jfrench
From: jfrench@photon.tamu.edu (Jeff French)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: dir | more
Message-ID: <4585@helios.TAMU.EDU>
Date: 16 Mar 90 00:58:41 GMT
References: <2165@orbit.cts.com> <12503@ucsd.Edu>
Sender: usenet@helios.TAMU.EDU
Reply-To: jfrench@cs.tamu.edu (Jeff French)
Organization: Texas A&M University, College Station, Texas
Lines: 25

In article <12503@ucsd.Edu> steve@wintermute.ucsd.edu ({Darkavich}) writes:
>In article <2165@orbit.cts.com> cheangkk@pnet51.orb.mn.org ( Cheang) writes:

>When I tyied to dir the root directory of my hard disk , floppy disk with the
>more , I always got two strange file name with 0 byte, the file name contains
>mostly number with 8 characters long, no extention name.
> 
>When I check this command " dir | more " or " dir/w | more " on my firends
>computer, it appear the same thing. I am using PC-DOS 3.3 , my friend is using
>MS-DOS 3.3. Moreover, those strange file name are always change, every time
>you try you got a different name.

  The files are DOS temporary files created using the "|" pipe filter.
  The odd file names are provided by the system clock and are in hex. Thus
  DOS can have multilple temp files and assure that they are all named
  differently. 

  Also note that this phenomenon only occurs in the root directory and with
  DOS ver 3.x or greater. Earlier versions had PIPE in the temp name.

  At any rate, use "dir/p" instead of "dir | more". It's faster and provides
  the same end result.
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    jfrench@cssuN.tamu.edu       Jeff French        "Gig-Em Aggies"
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