why is it that files just created do not have a dos name.example=docume~1.?

Question

I need this name to use on a very sensitive batch file but folders that just get created do not have one and they dont even when I restart my computer.The older files on my computer that I created do.Is there a setting (registry maybe) that might have turned these off. Thanks

Answer 1

Errr, that is a DOS name. DOS only understands 8.3 format (up to 8 characters or numbers, a dot and up to three characters or numbers).

If you use win95 / win98 then long names are hashed to fit this and somewhere there is a translate table that knows that docume~1 is equivalent to 'document folder created yesterday'... DOS sees the short name, Windows sees the long name. Win 2k and newer generally show you the long name in 'dos' too (cos they dont really use dos)... but some old programs can break this translation so you see funny names with ~ in.

What it does to hash them is ... take first 6 characters, put in a ~ and if it's the first of them put a 1 (= docume~1)... if it's the second then put a 2 and so on. I guess if you go far enough it would use 5 characters to make docum~10 and so on.

Dunno why the PC changed its behaviour. Was it upgraded or patched? Maybe the upgrade changed its behaviour a bit.