[Coco] Re: File extensions

[Ward Griffiths]

On Tuesday 19 October 2004 02:41 pm, Roger Taylor wrote:
> At 09:23 PM 10/18/2004, you wrote:
> >If MS didn't insist in the stupidity of identifying file types by
> >extension (particularly considering that most modern, non-MS file
> > format contain easy to recognize magic numbers you could name the
> > file whatever you wanted and still identify the file type. 
> > Incarnations of AmigaDOS from 3.0 onward had no problem with this. 
> > Unix systems using both CLI and GUI interfaces have never depended
> > much on file extensions to tell the user what type a file was
> > either.
>
> I think extensions are necessary because people are the ones doing
> the most looking and identifying.  Software can use the extension
> just like an internal magic number, but people cannot immediately see
> inside of a file to examine the contents, let alone a "magic" number
> (usually 4- to 8-character acronyms).

And it's not a guarantee even on a Unix system.  I've built a few files 
in my day to bypass the Magic.  I prefer it when extensions are used.  
I'm a BOfH.  If I catch one of my users playing silly games, he's 
deleted from more than just my systems.  He's got Saint Peter next on 
the list.  That was my policy even back in the mid 80s when I was still 
doing tech support (at a local RSCC) for our best friends in Fort 
Worth.  Nobody ever found the leftovers.  (Did you know that raccoons 
and skunks are omnivores like us, they mostly eat plants but they 
_really like_ meat)?
-- 
Ward Griffiths    wdg3rd at comcast.net    http://home.comcast.net/~wdg3rd/

You had to admire the way perfectly innocent words were mugged, ravaged,
stripped of all true meaning and decency, and then sent to walk the
gutter for Reacher Gilt, although "synergistically" had probably been a
whore from the start.                 -- Terry Pratchett, _Going Postal_