[vdr] Re: SAMBA incompatibilities with VFAT=1 directory names

[Klaus Schmidinger <Klaus.Schmidinger@cadsoft.de>]

Manfred Schmidt-Voigt wrote:
> 
> Hi Klaus and List,
> 
> with all these encoded characters we came slowly into the direction to have
> nearly human unreadable directory names. It is ok, that all the surrounding
> systems can read them, but for me it would be more easy to have a real
> readable name in the List of recordings and that I can read them on screen
> (OSD).

The encoded names *ARE* displayed correctly on VDR's OSD (as long as they
are both written and read with VFAT=1).

> And there are more problems with all these cryptic names. One
> example: I use somtimes the ftp voyager from RHINO Soft. It is a very nice
> tool on W2K but if a directoryname starts with %B or some other %<character>
> it can not read its content.

I'd consider this a bug of "ftp voyager" - why don't you ask the programmers of
that tool to fix it?

> And there will be more applications in the
> wilderness of M$ which will have problems with the directory names.

Oh, really?!

> So what do you think to get back to real file and directory names,

Without VFAT=1 VDR *DOES* write *REAL* names - Linux can do that :-)

> which might be cryptic for the human but very clear for the systems (a
> directoryname is a directoryname is a directoryname ...).

Huuh??! - What exactly are you voting for: human readable or encoded filenames?

> And if you stay
> with "old" filenameconvention (ASCII128, 8.3 uppercase(?) alphanumeric
> without characters below #20(space) ) you will nearly have no problems with
> any foreign system.

If Windows had implemented "long filenames" correctly in the first place,
we wouldn't be having this discussion.

> VDR could use than the summary file or whatever to create all that content
> for the human reading. As somtimes discussed here it could be from a XML
> file or any other structured datafile. But please keep it in a flat ASCII
> file again for compatibility.

I didn't choose Linux as "my" operating system, where I can store a recording's
name in its plain directory name, just to throw all this away because some
crappy, broken, so called "operating system" from Redmond is unable to deal with
directory names correctly. Encoding characters that cause problems under Windoze
is as far as I will go - if you want anything else, you can always implement that
yourself. However, the core VDR source will not do that as default. Linux can
handle any directory names, so why shouldn't VDR use this?

> Maybe there are real RFC's for directory and filenames and if they are there
> lets use them without (tricksing) doing everything what is possible.

There is no "tricksing" when VDR creates a directory with a plain text name.
It's neither VDR's nor Linux's fault that Windoze is broken.

Gee, a few days ago I said to myself I wouldn't get involved in discussions
about Windoze deficiencies any more. But when reading messages like this one,
requiring every software to limit itself to the capabilities (or lack thereof)
of Windoze, I just can't hold back... Why don't people march towards Redmond
and request M$ to fix *their* product?

Klaus
-- 
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Klaus Schmidinger                       Phone: +49-8635-6989-10
CadSoft Computer GmbH                   Fax:   +49-8635-6989-40
Hofmark 2                               Email:   kls@cadsoft.de
D-84568 Pleiskirchen, Germany           URL:     www.cadsoft.de
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