From: Austin Ziegler <halostatue@...>
Date: 2005-09-14T03:56:16+09:00
Subject: Re: File.split edge cases

On 9/13/05, Daniel Berger <Daniel.Berger@qwest.com> wrote:
> Austin Ziegler wrote:
>> Assuming that File.split should be implemented as [ File.dirname,
>> File.basename ]:
>>
>>   % dirname /foo/bar/
>>   /foo
>>   % basename /foo/bar/
>>   bar
>>   % dirname /
>>   /
>>   % basename /
>>   /
[...]
> Yeah, the closer I look at posixpath, the more I realize it's....
> wrong. Well, damn, with a name like "posixpath" you would *think* it
> would be correct, eh?

One might. ;)

>> Ruby has it right in both cases. On Windows, File.split() should be a
>> bit smarter:
>>
>>   File.split("C:\\")                # => [ "C:", "\\" ]
>>   File.split("\\\\server\\path\\")  # => [ "\\\\server\\path", "\\" ]
> Yes, I think really all that's needed are explicit checks for empty
> and root paths:

> # pseudo-code
> if path.root? or path.empty?
>     return path, ""
> else
>     return File.dirname(path), File.basename(path)
> end

Hmmm. I don't think that's right, still. "ls //" is valid on Unix, so
the existing behaviour is *correct*, if mildly unnerving. However, on
Windows, "dir \\" is not correct just as "dir C:\\" will not be correct.
Better to specifically check for the UNC-path and drive-path cases. Ruby
should also be smart enough to handle the \\.\ and \\?\ special
prefixes. I can write up a summary of what these are for and how they
should be handled, if that would help.

I believe that if this is fixed, it should go into 1.8.3 as well as 1.9.

-austin
-- 
Austin Ziegler * halostatue@gmail.com
               * Alternate: austin@halostatue.ca