Re: File archivers and special DOS/Windows device names

[Eli Zaretskii]

On Thu, 5 Jul 2001, 3APA3A wrote:

> If  archive  contains file with special name (such as prn, lpt1, com1,
> con,  etc) it will be extracted to this device instead of file. Tested
> with  pkzipc, WinRAR, rar, WinZip, tar (cygwin port under windows). In
> case of WinZip and tar file will be extracted silently, in other cases
> overwrite confirmation required.

I cannot speak for WinZip, pkzip, and other programs, but as for GNU Tar, 
what you mention is a bug in the ported Cygwin executable.  Try the DJGPP 
port of Tar, and you will see that it handles such file names gracefully:

  ftp://ftp.simtel.net/pub/simtelnet/gnu/djgpp/v2gnu/tar112ab.zip

Also, `prn' and `lpt1' are just a sample of the special names.  Any 
device driver which can be reached by opening a special file name will 
cause such problems; thus the list of the offending names cannot be 
known in advance, since additional device drivers can be installed on 
the target system.

In addition, the file-name extension is ignored when the basename 
matches.  So `aux.lst', `prn.c', `con.foo', and an infinite number of 
other similar names--all of them are prone to this problem.  Some of the 
devices will actually wedge the DOS box if you try to extract a file by 
that name; kids, don't try that at home!