rsync - Sep 2002 - limit of 256 characters in pathname

Hi,

We use rsync on NT (server and client) and we get errors on filenames with
a path that has in total more than 256 characters. This seems to be caused
by a limit in rsync, not in NT. Is there a way to break this limit withuo
having to manually shorten all this filenames?

Thx already!


Rgds,

Bart Coninckx
Network Administrator
CNE, ASE
*************************************
Watco ICT Services
Lilsedijk 19
B-2340 Beerse
Belgium

e-mail: bart.coninckx@watco.be
Tel: + 32 (0) 14 60 99 42
Fax: + 32 (0) 14 62 41 47
*************************************

On Wed, Sep 11, 2002 at 07:40:01PM +0200, you [bart.coninckx@watco.be]
wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> We use rsync on NT (server and client) and we get errors on filenames with
> a path that has in total more than 256 characters. This seems to be caused
> by a limit in rsync, not in NT. Is there a way to break this limit withuo
> having to manually shorten all this filenames?
Which rsync version for windows are you using?

If you are using the cygwin version, the 256 character limit is set by
the cygwin API. 

You are right in that NT (/w2k/xp) and NTFS allow for longer filenames, but
not through the normal Win32 API functions. You need to use the unicode
versions of the file access functions, prepend a '\\?\' prefix to turn
of
file path parsing, and even then, individual path components cannot exceed
MAX_PAH (255).

I don't have time to test this, but perhaps you can bypass your problem by 
mounting the desired directory higher in the heirarchy?  I don't know if 
the underlying character counts count against the limit, but it's worth a 
try.

Tim Conway
tim.conway@philips.com
303.682.4917 office, 303.921.0301 cell
Philips Semiconductor - Longmont TC
1880 Industrial Circle, Suite D
Longmont, CO 80501
Available via SameTime Connect within Philips, caesupport2 on AIM
"There are some who call me.... Tim?"




Ville Herva <vherva@niksula.hut.fi>
Sent by: rsync-admin@lists.samba.org
09/14/2002 12:40 PM

 
        To:     bart.coninckx@watco.be
        cc:     rsync@lists.samba.org
(bcc: Tim Conway/LMT/SC/PHILIPS)
        Subject:        Re: limit of 256 characters in pathname
        Classification: 



On Wed, Sep 11, 2002 at 07:40:01PM +0200, you [bart.coninckx@watco.be] 
wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> We use rsync on NT (server and client) and we get errors on filenames 
with
> a path that has in total more than 256 characters. This seems to be 
caused
> by a limit in rsync, not in NT. Is there a way to break this limit 
withuo
> having to manually shorten all this filenames?
Which rsync version for windows are you using?

If you are using the cygwin version, the 256 character limit is set by
the cygwin API. 

You are right in that NT (/w2k/xp) and NTFS allow for longer filenames, 
but
not through the normal Win32 API functions. You need to use the unicode
versions of the file access functions, prepend a '\\?\' prefix to turn
of
file path parsing, and even then, individual path components cannot exceed
MAX_PAH (255).