GNU bug report logs - #19463
25.0.50; Files with special chars in the name cannot be written on MS Windows

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Message #11 received at 19463 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Michael Albinus <michael.albinus <at> gmx.de>
To: Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org>
Cc: 19463 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: Re: bug#19463: 25.0.50;
 Files with special chars in the name cannot be written on MS Windows
Date: Mon, 29 Dec 2014 22:55:13 +0100

Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org> writes:

> It's a basic documented limitation of the file APIs, at least on the
> level that Emacs on Windows uses them.  See
>
>   http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windows/desktop/aa365247%28v=vs.85%29.aspx
>
> (look under "Naming Conventions").

Thanks for the link. So I will adapt that test for the MS-Windows case.

>> Files with special characters in their file name cannont be written
>> locally. The following test is derived from tramp-test30-special-characters.
>> Note, that this testcase runs w/o problems under GNU/Linux.
>
> This is expected.  What exactly do you want us to do with this issue?
> Unless we radically change the way we do file I/O (similarly to what
> Cygwin does), which is a very large job, this issue cannot be
> resolved.
>
> We simply should not use such file names on Windows.

At least we shall mention this restriction, for example in
(info "(emacs) Windows Files")

For me as native user it is not obvious, that " " is allowed, but "\t" isn't.

In your reference link, other reserved file names are also mentioned,
like NUL etc. This is something one shall know as well.

Maybe it is not necessary to document all those restrictions in the
Emacs manual. But a hint might be useful, combined with a reference
(maybe the link you have given).

Best regards, Michael.

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