Searching Filenames

Searches of filenames apply to both the filename and its alias. The system presents a single unified namespace so that a single physical view of the file is preserved. However, if the result of a search shows only the long filename, it could be confusing to the user. For example, a set of files in a directory might include the following filenames and aliases.

A search of files in the directory using DIR *1 would display the following information.

LONGFI~1    123    05-11-95    15:26    LongFileName 
FILE-1      352    05-11-95    16:01    File-1

Note that the DIR command displays the alias first for compatibility with the older DIR format. However, a search utility that is aware of long filenames but displays only the filename, would also show both the LongFileName and File-1 files. This could be confusing at first glance to the user because the LongFileName file does not have the number 1 as specified in the search criteria. The file was matched to the search pattern because its alias contains the number 1.

The wildcard searches have been expanded in Windows 95/98. Using the old search criteria, the first * encountered caused all following characters to be ignored. However, in the preceding example, *1 is a valid specification. More than one wildcard can be used in Windows 95/98 when specifying search criteria. For example, to search for all files that contain the word mid somewhere in the filename, *mid* can be specified as the search criteria.