Chami.com Tips

Long and short file names explained

Now that we can use long file names (file names longer than 11 characters), here are some facts about them and short file names:

• Every long file name has an alias that complies with the 8.3 file names for backward compatibility.
• 8.3 aliases to long file names consist of the first 6 characters of the long file name followed by a ~ and an incrementing number/character. For example, if there are two or more long file names starting with the same six characters, then the number/character followed by ~ will be incremented until an unique file name is generated.
• Short file names may contain only the following characters:
  • Numbers (0,1-9)
  • Letters (A-Z, a-z)
  • Blank (yes, theoretically you can have spaces!)
  • ASCII characters greater than 127
  • Special characters:
    • $ % ' - _ @ ~ ` ! ( ) ^ # &
• Long file names may contain only the following characters:
  • All of the characters supported by short file names
  • Special characters:
    • + , ; = [ ]
• Length of the long file names are limited to 255 characters (260 for full paths) and short file names are limited to 8+3 or 11 characters (80 for full path names).