Linked by Thom Holwerda on Thu 2nd Jul 2009 16:17 UTC, submitted by lemur2
Linux The FAT file system is the file system used by MS-DOS and earlier versions of Windows. It's a relatively simple and straightforward file system, supported by just about any operating system, making it the favoured file system on memory cards and the like. FAT is an ECMA and ISO standard, but these only apply for FAT12 and FAT16 without support for long file names, and therein lies a problem.
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Hmm...
by darknexus on Thu 2nd Jul 2009 17:03 UTC
darknexus
Member since:
2008-07-15

Are they sure this won't break some portable devices? Compatibility with Windows itself is all well and good, but there's no telling what sort of odd firmware bugs this is going to uncover on various embedded and/or portable devices. I'd hate to see some portable device or another not work with files stored on it by Linux, and then get the typical "tell the vendor to fix the thing" response from the kernel heads.
This should be interesting...

RE: Hmm...
by Rahul on Thu 2nd Jul 2009 17:21 in reply to "Hmm..."
Rahul Member since:
2005-07-06

They have tested with various devices and haven't found any issues. If you see or predict any problems in a particular case, you should let them know now.

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RE: Hmm...
by werfu on Thu 2nd Jul 2009 17:24 in reply to "Hmm..."
werfu Member since:
2005-09-15

There's nothing stoping you to write a filename of 8.3 lenght in the long filename, nor from reading it from there (simply truncate it).

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