R devel - Feb 2023 - Undocumented change of dirname("C:/") on R-devel on Windows

On 2/23/23 03:27, Hiroaki Yutani wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I found dirname() behaves differently on R-devel on Windows. Since I'm
not
> sure which behavior is right, let me ask here before filing this to R's
> Bigzilla.
>
> On R 4.2.2., we get
>
>      > dirname("C:/")
>      [1] "C:/"
>
> However, on R-devel (r83888), we get
>
>      > dirname("C:/")
>      [1] "."
>
> ?dirname says 'dirname returns the part of the path up to but excluding
the
> last path separator, or "." if there is no path separator,'
but I don't see
> how the root path is supposed to be treated based on this rule (, whether
> it's WIndows or UNIX-alike).
Thanks for spotting the difference, I've reverted to the previous 
behavior, the change was unintentional. If you spot any other suspicious 
changes in behavior in file-system operations, please
report.
> What should we expect as the return value of dirname("C:/")? I
feel the
> current behavior on R 4.2.2 is right, but I'd like to confirm.
I also think the old behavior is better, even though it could be argued 
whether the "/" in "C:/" is a path separator or not, and
whether it is
trailing or not. But the behavior is in line with Unix where dirname of 
"/" is also "/". Msys2 would return "C:".

If? "/" in "C:/" is a path separator but not a trailing path
separator,
then basename("C:/") should probably be "" and not
"C:", and this would
be in line with what R does on Unix. However, to be in line with Unix, I 
think the basename of "C:/" should be "C:/". Yet, Msys2
returns "C:"
which is what R does now.

So what these functions should do on Windows is definitely tricky. In 
either case the behavior is now again as in R 4.2.2.

Best
Tomas
>
> Best,
> Yutani
>
> 	[[alternative HTML version deleted]]
>
> ______________________________________________
> R-devel at r-project.org mailing list
> https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-devel

Thanks for the prompt response, I'll confirm it after the new R-devel
binary is available.
Also, thanks for the detailed explanation. I agree with you in general.
> "/" in "C:/" is a path separator or not, and whether it
is trailing or not
It seems a Windows' path basically consists of two components; a drive
specification (e.g., C:) and the directory structure within the drive. What
I learned today is that both "C:/" and "C:" are valid path
specifications,
but refer to different locations; "C:" is not the root directory of
the
drive, but just a relative path [1]. So, I agree with you that the basename
of "C:/" should be "C:/". However, at the same time, I
don't feel this is
worth a breaking change, so I think we can preserve the current (R 4.2.2)
behavior.

[1]:
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/standard/io/file-path-formats#apply-the-current-directory

Best,
Yutani

2023?2?23?(?) 17:15 Tomas Kalibera <tomas.kalibera at gmail.com>:
>
> On 2/23/23 03:27, Hiroaki Yutani wrote:
> > Hi,
> >
> > I found dirname() behaves differently on R-devel on Windows. Since
I'm
> not
> > sure which behavior is right, let me ask here before filing this to
R's
> > Bigzilla.
> >
> > On R 4.2.2., we get
> >
> >      > dirname("C:/")
> >      [1] "C:/"
> >
> > However, on R-devel (r83888), we get
> >
> >      > dirname("C:/")
> >      [1] "."
> >
> > ?dirname says 'dirname returns the part of the path up to but
excluding
> the
> > last path separator, or "." if there is no path
separator,' but I don't
> see
> > how the root path is supposed to be treated based on this rule (,
whether
> > it's WIndows or UNIX-alike).
> Thanks for spotting the difference, I've reverted to the previous
> behavior, the change was unintentional. If you spot any other suspicious
> changes in behavior in file-system operations, please report.
> > What should we expect as the return value of dirname("C:/")?
I feel the
> > current behavior on R 4.2.2 is right, but I'd like to confirm.
>
> I also think the old behavior is better, even though it could be argued
> whether the "/" in "C:/" is a path separator or not,
and whether it is
> trailing or not. But the behavior is in line with Unix where dirname of
> "/" is also "/". Msys2 would return "C:".
>
> If  "/" in "C:/" is a path separator but not a trailing
path separator,
> then basename("C:/") should probably be "" and not
"C:", and this would
> be in line with what R does on Unix. However, to be in line with Unix, I
> think the basename of "C:/" should be "C:/". Yet, Msys2
returns "C:"
> which is what R does now.
>
> So what these functions should do on Windows is definitely tricky. In
> either case the behavior is now again as in R 4.2.2.
>
> Best
> Tomas
>
> >
> > Best,
> > Yutani
> >
> >       [[alternative HTML version deleted]]
> >
> > ______________________________________________
> > R-devel at r-project.org mailing list
> > https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-devel
>
	[[alternative HTML version deleted]]