From: DAUTREVAUX AT microprocess DOT com (Bernard Dautrevaux) Subject: RE: Case sensitivity in filenames 12 Jan 1999 06:20:05 -0800 Message-ID: <8135911A809AD211AF6300A02480D1750348B7.cygnus.gnu-win32@IIS000.microdata.fr> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit To: "'cgf AT cygnus DOT com'" , gnu-win32 AT cygnus DOT com > -----Message d'origine----- > De: cgf AT cygnus DOT com [SMTP:cgf AT cygnus DOT com] > Date: Friday, January 08, 1999 17:06 > À: gnu-win32 AT cygnus DOT com > Objet: Re: Case sensitivity in filenames > > In article > <19990108162522 DOT 12567 DOT cygnus DOT gnu-win32 AT mundook DOT cs DOT mu DOT OZ DOT AU>, > Fergus Henderson wrote: > >I agree with this. The default behaviour should be as Unix-like as > >possible. However, don't forget that the goal is *porting* Unix > tools. > >A proper port to Windows will be case-insensitive as far as > file-names > >are concerned, because that is what Windows users expect. Therefore, > >there should be a simple way of enabling case-insensitivity. > > If someone wants to donate a patch to enable this "simple way" of > enabling > case sensitivity, I'll be happy to get it into the sources ASAP. > > Unfortunately, the point that seems to be consistently missed is that > this isn't just a simple "just fix cygwin" solution. There are many > tools which use their own version of glob or regexp or whatever. Each > one of these has to be modified. > OK, so if that's the case ;-(, the minimum, that do not cost anything, could be to define and document a way to say that we want case insesitive globbing of regexping of file names, so that we do not have different environment variables or options for each tools that finally handle this. I would like not to have a bunch of environment variables named LS_DOS_LIKE, BASH_IGLOB, FIND_DEFAULT_INAME, etc or having to use special options to any tool, when some globally IMPOSED environmant variable could be used by anybody... Of course we are talking of free software, so enforcing something may seem silly, but software could only be successful if its features are coherent and as uniform as possible... I would favour some environment variable like GLOB_MODE=(unix,windows), with the default being unix (for unix compatibility) that could be tested by any tool using glob or regexp on filenames to select how to match file names. These tools could also profitably allow some option to change the default set by GLOB_MODE (or any better named environment variable); for example find has "-name" that will use the default set by GLOB_MODE, "-iname" which allways use case-independant globbing and could aslo have "-dname" (d for dependant) for case-dependant globbing. I do not say we must DO the work for all utilities NOW, just that it seems a good moment to DEFINE how people can do it later on and submit patches that can be integrated simply. Just my few pence... Regards, Bernard ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------ Bernard Dautrevaux Microprocess Ingéniérie 97 bis, rue de Colombes 92400 COURBEVOIE FRANCE Tel: +33 (0) 1 47 68 80 80 Fax: +33 (0) 1 47 88 97 85 e-mail: dautrevaux AT microprocess DOT com b DOT dautrevaux AT usa DOT net ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ------ - For help on using this list (especially unsubscribing), send a message to "gnu-win32-request AT cygnus DOT com" with one line of text: "help".