Mail Archives: djgpp/1996/09/18/08:35:34
On Wed, 18 Sep 1996, Eli Zaretskii wrote:
>This is one area where the desire to be compatible with both Unix and
>MSDOS lead to contradiction that has to be resolved in a somewhat kludgy
>(IMHO) way. Since on MSDOS the hidden files aren't usually shown,
>`readdir' doesn't ask for them. If you make `readdir' behave otherwise,
>MSDOS programs which use `readdir' will suffer. Portable programs that
>absolutely must see all the directory entries, should set the bits in the
>`__opendir_flags' variable (look it up in the library docs) to that
>effect.
I suppose there are few (if at all) native DOS programs using readdir().
Thoses of them using these calls are usually ported from Unix or meant to work
on Unix (althoug I suspect these are rare). Frankly, I don't see why a program
might suffer from seeing hid/sys files? Unless it assumes all files to be
archives. In this case such an application is buggy and should not be taken
care of. OTOH an application (such as mine which generates a .html file with
directory listing) HAS to know all the files no matter on what system do they
run. To make it clear, I have nothing against setting flags in
'__opendir_flags' ;-)) but in this case 100% compatibility may be achieved
with no harm for DOS programs.
**********************************************************************
So if you ask me how do I feel inside, I could honestly tell you we've
been taken on a very long ride. And if my owners let me have free time
some day, with all good intention I would probably run away!
Clutching the short straw...
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