Win/DOS long and short file names - problem

[Dave Johnson29]

Hi All,

I am looking for a utility that displays both the DOS short filenames and the long filenames. Any suggestion?

I have some old software that runs a cnc machine under DOS 6.22 in win98. I create the tool-path files using software that runs under Vista and has file names such as

Holes for square blank.cnc
Holes for round blank.cnc

When I try to load the files in the DOS based software I get the DOS short version of the filenames.

Holes~1.cnc
Holes~2.cnc

All of that works OK, but if the tool-path file is modified at the cnc machine, I need to know which short name refers back to the long name. Currently I search for the changed file, but that can take some time when I have 200 files. The date stamp is updated when the cnc machine closes the files, so all files that day have the same date stamp.

Thanks for any help.

Dave

[Phil Thien]

At a command-prompt in the appropriate folder you can type "dir /x" to get both short and long names.

[Dave Johnson29]

Thanks Phil,

I should have mentioned I had tried that but that the CMD prompt window cannot be widened to view the complete line and there is no wrap or horizontal scroll bar for some reason.

Hovering over the left and right borders, I get the double-end arrows that look like it should expand but it does not. If I click for "full screen" it just extends the window to the top and bottom of the screen but stays the same width.

[Phil Thien]

How much of the long file name do you need for uniqueness? In my 80-character wide command prompt, I have enough room for approx. 28 characters in the long file name. Which is fine unless your long file names are > 28 characters and something like:

"This_happens_to_be_long_filename_number_1"
"This_happens_to_be_long_filename_number_2"

In a case like that you wouldn't be able to see the _1 or _2.

Tell us more, someone will be able to help.

[Scott Shepherd]

I don't have an answer, but it's good to see you again Dave!

[Dave Johnson29]

Problem solved,

I wrote a rough and dirty Delphi app that displays both. Took about 10 minutes, should not have been so lazy to start with.

[Doug Shepard]

Cant you just do "dir /x > textfile.txt" then use Notepad or similar to view the output?

[Dave Johnson29]

I don't have an answer, but it's good to see you again Dave!

Hi Scott,

Thanks, but I was only making a flash visit to call on the collective wisdom of the internet.

[Dave Johnson29]

Cant you just do "dir /x > textfile.txt" then use Notepad or similar to view the output?

Yeah, I guess I could have but I tossed together a program that lists the file names in two side-by-side list boxes. As I mentioned, I was being too lazy, but I thought someone may have had a utility that did this.