Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!usc!csun!kithrup!sef
From: sef@kithrup.COM (Sean Eric Fagan)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.sysv386
Subject: Re: 14 character limitation in filenames
Message-ID: <1991Jan30.014707.18190@kithrup.COM>
Date: 30 Jan 91 01:47:07 GMT
References: <290@sps.com>
Organization: Kithrup Enterprises, Ltd.
Lines: 35

In article <290@sps.com> arm@sps.com (Annette Myjak) writes:
>can anyone explain why there's the 14 character limitation in filenames
>(11 + 3 for extension) in interactive unix?

It is *not* 11+3.  It is 14.  Period.  Note that

	touch abcdefghik.lmn

(which is 11, '.', 3) would not create the file would think.

In standard SysVrX, where X is less than 4, there is a limit of 14
characters for filenames.  In those filenames, any character, with the
exceptions of nil (0x00) and '/', are permissable.  (As oppposed to BSD,
which still, I believe, has the limitation that only characters with the
high bit clear are valid.)

>is this common for all 386 based unices?

Uhm.  Uhm.  Eek.  For all SysVr3.2 '386 unices, yes.  Some have added the
extensions necessary for longer filenames, although there is a *lot* of
trivial things that most vendords don't cover.  ESIX, in particular, I
believe has a version of 3.2 that allows a BSD-style filesystem.

For SysVr4, the "limitation" isn't there; there is, instead, a limit of 255
characters.

>is this limitation likely to be overcome anytime soon?

Yes.

-- 
Sean Eric Fagan  | "I made the universe, but please don't blame me for it;
sef@kithrup.COM  |  I had a bellyache at the time."
-----------------+           -- The Turtle (Stephen King, _It_)
Any opinions expressed are my own, and generally unpopular with others.