Re: VMS can not include "float+.h"

[Bruno Haible]

Paul Eggert writes:
> Perhaps Gnulib source files should be renamed to use just the characters 
> in the POSIX Portable Filename Character Set 
> <http://pubs.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/9699919799/basedefs/V1_chap03.html#tag_03_282>.
>  

I vehemently disagree. The relevant file name restrictions nowadays are
those of Windows (no characters " * / : < > ? \ , file names don't end in '.',
file names avoid special names such as "aux", "nul", "prt"). We have been
leaving the 8+3 restrictions of Windows 3.1 (which disappeared from the
marked around 1995-1997) between 2000 and 2011. Before that, it was
commonplace that packages targeting DOS platforms had a special script
for renaming the source files (e.g. [1]).

VMS is a very small niche system. If such a renaming of source files was
possible for DOS, it must equally be possible for VMS.

Other GNU packages that use the '+' character in file names, independently
of gnulib:
gcc, glibc, binutils, coreutils, bison, gettext, clisp, gperf.

POSIX is partially outdated, as has already been noted on this list. [2]

Bruno

[1] 
http://git.savannah.gnu.org/gitweb/?p=libiconv.git;a=blob;f=djgpp/fnchange.lst
[2] https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-gnulib/2017-02/msg00069.html