tar won't extract all files when a file with exe extension precedes the same without extension inside the archive

Andrey Repin anrdaemon@freemail.ru
Fri Jul 13 01:05:00 GMT 2012


Greetings, Andy Hall!

> At the risk of adding more fuel to the fire, let me add my 2 cents worth to
> this.

> 1.  As a long time and frequent user of tar and rsync to transfer files and
> directories between Windows and various UNIX flavors, I have been astonished
> (and severely burned) by the fact that transferring  files back and forth
> between Windows and other UNIX machines via tar, rsync, cp -r or other
> similar mechanisms are not idempotent operations, at least with respect to
> file names and contents.  This violates the "principle of least
> astonishment" not to mention that it breaks things in not so obvious and
> surprising ways when it happens.  

This is to be expected. The ways *NIX and Windows store file metadata are
different. Very different. Starting from differences in sets of allowed
character for file names, and to the subtle difference in ACL handling.
With all that lie in between.

> 2.  Since this is a "Windows thing", is there some reason why the execution
> of "file" or "file.exe" isn't handled as a special case in the exec call
> (and all its flavors) and no place else?

It actually have VERY simple answer.

test -x file && command

> For example, it would seem that if exec is asked to run "file" with no .exe
> extension and that file does not exist or is not executable, then it could
> try "file.exe" if that exists and is executable.


--
WBR,
Andrey Repin (anrdaemon@freemail.ru) 13.07.2012, <04:51>

Sorry for my terrible english...


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