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What characters should be restricted from a Unix file name?

Asked 2009-01-19T15:34:01.700
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Consider a Save As dialog with a free text entry where the user enters a file name as free text, then clicks a Save button. The software then validates the file name, and saves the file if the name is valid.

On a Unix file system, what rules should be applied in the validation such that:

  • The name will not be difficult to manipulate later in terms of escaping special characters, etc.
  • The rules are not so restrictive that saving a file becomes non-user-friendly.

So basically, what is the minimum set of characters that should be restricted from a Unix file name?

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The minimum are slash ('/') and NULL ('\0')

answered 2009-01-19T15:37:25.187

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