Subject: Re: bug#70792: 30.0.50; [PATCH] Add Eshell support for expanding absolute file names within the current remote connection

From: Michael Albinus <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 09 May 2024 20:22:57 +0200

Eli Zaretskii <[email-masked]> writes:

Hi Eli,

>> FTR, we *have* already two different kinds of quoting. "/:<something>"
>> makes <something> local, whatever syntax it has (for example, Tramp file
>> name syntax).
>>
>> "/method:user@host:/:<something>" makes <something> "local" on
>> "/method:user@host:" whatever syntax it has.
>
> There's a fine nuance here: "/:" does NOT make a file name locale, it
> prevents interpreting it as remote due to the "/something:" construct
> in it.  "/:" does NOT change the semantics of "/foo/bar/baz", it only
> changes the semantics of "/method:user@host:/foo/bar".

The intenmtion of file name quoting isn't to make a file name local or
remote. This is just a side-effect in case of Tramp.

The intention of file name quoting is to suppress file name handlers of
any kind.

"/:/method:user@host:/foo/bar.gz" makes "/method:user@host:/foo/bar.gz"
a literal file name, not to be transferred to any file name handler.

"/method:user@host:/:/foo/bar.gz" keeps the Tramp file name handler
active, but makes "/:/foo/bar.gz" a literal file name "/foo/bar.gz" on
the remote machine. This suppresses the jka-compr-handler, for example.

Likely, you mean the same, but I wanted to say it explicitly.

Best regards, Michael.