Re: Ada.Directories problems, a summary

["Dmitry A. Kazakov" <mailbox@dmitry-kazakov.de>]

On Thu, 1 Jan 2009 12:16:55 +0100, Dmitry A. Kazakov wrote:

> After experimenting with Ada.Directories I collected the issues I think
> must be addressed to make Ada.Directories more usable:
> 
> 1. Name encoding. Either String versions should be UTF-8 or else replaced
> with Wide_Wide_String ones.
> 
> 2. Name canonization / comparison functions. Presently it is impossible to
> compare files by names because the same file may have potentially an
> infinite number of names.
> 
> 3. Fake children "." and ".." should have special File_Kind
> (Virtual_Directory_File, for example). Else it is impossible to traverse
> the directory tree in a portable way.
> 
> 4. There should be a variant of Start_Search without the Directory
> parameter, in order to enumerate the roots of the file systems. For
> example, to find drive letters under Windows, network shares, mount points
> etc.
> 
> 5. The behavior of Exists must be specified for the case of mountable
> volumes. Presently GNAT implementation pops a message box under Windows.
> This should be outlawed.
> 
> 6. Is_Mountable / Is_Removable functions should be provided.
> 
> 7. Version number in addition to Containing_Directory, Base_Name and
> Extension. (Files have version numbers under VMS)

8. Containing_Directory need to be clarified / refined. RM A.16 76/2 and
A.16 127/2 seem to contradict each other.

The GNAT implementation of Containing_Directory returns for "foo.txt" the
current folder. A.16 127/2, in my understanding, says that the result
should be Name_Error, since as a path "foo.txt" has no any [= including
"containing"] directory specified. As an external file it surely has one.

Ergo, is Containing_Directory a path operation or an operation on the
external file? [Clearly there should be two operations.]

-- 
Regards,
Dmitry A. Kazakov
http://www.dmitry-kazakov.de