LongFiles
How does it work?
If you've ever looked at a disc from a Windoze95 user, then the chances are that you may have seen filenames such as "PROGRA~1.EXE". The "~" is a special character that is used by Windoze to indicate that it is a long filename; using Windoze95, you will see the long filename, whereas the underlying file system (DOS [FAT]) sees the short filename.
LongFiles works in a similar fashion. When you save a file as "SomeLongName", it will be actually saved as "SomeLo}000". Here, the "}" is the special character, and the "000" is an index to make the whole system work faster (after all, we are using a fast operating system).
When the filing system needs to be catalogued, LongFiles replaces these filenames with their long filenames. This occurs in the Desktop, and also
in the command line. Any program which uses standard operating system calls (OS_GBPB) will see the long filenames instead of the short names.
To do all of this, LongFiles claims several filing system routines to do with creating, examining and listing files. Since not all filing systems suffer from this problem, it is possible to claim individual filing systems. Also, LongFiles maintains an index of the long filenames in a special file called "!ZZ!!Z!LF". When cataloging, this file is not displayed, and if there are no LongFiles in the directory, the file is removed. LongFiles can also be removed from filing systems - in which case, you will see the short forms of the filenames, just as you would for a Windoze95 disc.
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