[OT] Win32 and forward/backslashes (was "The format of filename")

[Neil Cerutti]

On 2006-10-26, Tim Chase <python.list at tim.thechases.com> wrote:
> There's no "zip" in the "baz" directory, so let's copy it
> there:
>
> C:\temp>copy foo/bar/zip foo/baz
> foo\zip
> Overwrite foo\zip? (Yes/No/All): y
> The file cannot be copied onto itself.
>          0 file(s) copied.
>
> What the [expletive]!?  Well, there's a "zip" in our temp
> directory, but no "pip".  How about we try copying "pip" to the
> "baz" directory instead while keeping the same syntax as above?
>
> C:\temp>copy foo/bar/pip foo/baz
> The syntax of the command is incorrect.
>
> BLOODY MADNESS!
>
> Some OS programmer doesn't seem to have graduated from their
> CompSci program...

It comes from every DOS command traditionally doing it's own path
globbing and unglobbing since the shell doesn't do it. You would
think that a library would've been available to DOS programmers
to unify that procedure, but apparently not.

-- 
Neil Cerutti