Re: executable extension?

["Larry Hall (RFK Partners, Inc)" <lhall at rfk dot com>]

At 01:10 PM 11/13/2001, Jerry Heyman wrote:


>I didn't see this in the FAQ (maybe I'm just blind) but I've
>noticed the following:
>
>$ cp du.exe du
>cp: 'du.exe' and 'du' are the same file
>
>In stepping through the code, I see that this is the result of
>the:
>
>   same = (SAME_INODE(src_sb, dst_sb));
>
>statement in copy.c
>
>I guess I'm trying to understand why stat() sees filename.exe
>and filename as the same file :-(


This is historical support for Win9x/ME.  It's not possible to run an
executable on these systems unless the executable exists with a ".exe" 
extension.  Win9x/ME is *very* extension-oriented.  NT-based systems 
don't have this restriction.  Many existing scripts that people want to 
use don't add ".exe" to each executable.  Most people don't even type 
executable names with this extension (nor want to).  As a result,
we need to map the command name without the extension to the one with,
to satisfy Win9x/ME.  That's the reason.

Now say, thank you Bill! ;-)



Larry Hall                              lhall@rfk.com
RFK Partners, Inc.                      http://www.rfk.com
838 Washington Street                   (508) 893-9779 - RFK Office
Holliston, MA 01746                     (508) 893-9889 - FAX


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