samba - Feb 2013 - Question marks, asterisks, colons in filenames

Hi,

I suppose this question must have been posted a hundred times, but 
Google brings up nothing useful:

Consider "The Wall" from Pink Floyd in an MP3 collection. There's
"In
The Flesh.mp3" and "In The Flesh?.mp3" as tracks. Or, another
example in
an MP3 collection: There's a Band called "Stellar", but
there's also a
band called "Stellar*". Naming files like this is no problem in Linux.

Now I had the idea of using my files on other computers such as Macs 
and Windows-boxes, but both Systems have trouble with the characters 
mentioned above.

My question is how Samba can help me to map these characters to 
something else so that the files become usable on the Windows/Mac side 
*without destroying the readability of the filenames entorely*. Hashing 
into 8.3 random character sequences with "mangled names = yes" is not 
really an option.

What is the successor of the removed "mangled map" option? I did not 
find anything in the current man page of smb.conf (5).

I'm running Samba 3.5.10, which is the latest in CentOS 6.3.

Surely there must be some elegant way to fix this? I don't want to 
rename all my files at the Linux end.

Any help would be very appreciated.

Cheers,
Raimund

On 18/02/13 19:16, Ray wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I suppose this question must have been posted a hundred times, but
> Google brings up nothing useful:
>
> Consider "The Wall" from Pink Floyd in an MP3 collection.
There's "In
> The Flesh.mp3" and "In The Flesh?.mp3" as tracks. Or,
another example in
> an MP3 collection: There's a Band called "Stellar", but
there's also a
> band called "Stellar*". Naming files like this is no problem in
Linux.
>
Anyone putting "special" characters in file names has a special place
in
hell reserved for them. It is plain stupid, just don't do it.

Personally I would name them all wall01.mp3, wall02.mp3 etc. and add ID3 
tags to them. Any decent graphical file manager and/or music player will 
display the tag information. Stop abusing the filename to store metadata 
when there is a standard for storing that metadata in the file.

JAB.

-- 
Jonathan A. Buzzard                 Email: jonathan (at) buzzard.me.uk
Fife, United Kingdom.

Am Montag, 18. Februar 2013, 20:16:15 schrieb Ray:
> Hi,
> 
> I suppose this question must have been posted a hundred times, but
> Google brings up nothing useful:
> 
> Consider "The Wall" from Pink Floyd in an MP3 collection.
There's "In
> The Flesh.mp3" and "In The Flesh?.mp3" as tracks. Or,
another example in
> an MP3 collection: There's a Band called "Stellar", but
there's also a
> band called "Stellar*". Naming files like this is no problem in
Linux.
> 
> Now I had the idea of using my files on other computers such as Macs
> and Windows-boxes, but both Systems have trouble with the characters
> mentioned above.
> 
> My question is how Samba can help me to map these characters to
> something else so that the files become usable on the Windows/Mac side
> *without destroying the readability of the filenames entorely*. Hashing
> into 8.3 random character sequences with "mangled names = yes" is
not
> really an option.
> 
> What is the successor of the removed "mangled map" option? I did
not
> find anything in the current man page of smb.conf (5).
> 
> I'm running Samba 3.5.10, which is the latest in CentOS 6.3.
> 
> Surely there must be some elegant way to fix this? I don't want to
> rename all my files at the Linux end.
> 
> Any help would be very appreciated.
> 
> Cheers,
> Raimund
Hi Raimund,
I guess you were the one to whom i was talking on IRC some days ago.
I assured you to have a look at the source of VFS vfs_catia.c, because
we were not able to get it working and it caught my inetrest, too.

Also there is nearly NO info on the web about the usage of this
re-written vfs module - the samba man page is useless (only old
usage info)

I now found the bug in vfs_catia.c and will push a fix soon.
See http://pastie.org/6313997
how it is working. One can specify translations for all
invalid windows characters \ / : * ? " < > | and even more ones.

I hope this is the one you were looking for.  :-)

Cheers, G?nter

Am 2013-02-22 08:36, schrieb G?nter Kukkukk:
> Am Freitag, 22. Februar 2013, 05:09:58 schrieb G?nter Kukkukk:
>> Am Freitag, 22. Februar 2013, 04:18:33 schrieb G?nter Kukkukk:
>> > Am Montag, 18. Februar 2013, 20:16:15 schrieb Ray:
>> > > Hi,
>> > >
>> > > I suppose this question must have been posted a hundred
times,
>> but
>> > > Google brings up nothing useful:
>> > >
>> > > Consider "The Wall" from Pink Floyd in an MP3
collection.
>> There's "In
>> > > The Flesh.mp3" and "In The Flesh?.mp3" as
tracks. Or, another
>> example
>> > > in an MP3 collection: There's a Band called
"Stellar", but
>> there's
>> > > also a band called "Stellar*". Naming files like
this is no
>> problem in
>> > > Linux.
>> > >
>> > > Now I had the idea of using my files on other computers such
as
>> Macs
>> > > and Windows-boxes, but both Systems have trouble with the 
>> characters
>> > > mentioned above.
>> > >
>> > > My question is how Samba can help me to map these characters
to
>> > > something else so that the files become usable on the 
>> Windows/Mac side
>> > > *without destroying the readability of the filenames
entorely*.
>> Hashing
>> > > into 8.3 random character sequences with "mangled names
= yes"
>> is not
>> > > really an option.
>> > >
>> > > What is the successor of the removed "mangled map"
option? I did
>> not
>> > > find anything in the current man page of smb.conf (5).
>> > >
>> > > I'm running Samba 3.5.10, which is the latest in CentOS
6.3.
>> > >
>> > > Surely there must be some elegant way to fix this? I
don't want
>> to
>> > > rename all my files at the Linux end.
>> > >
>> > > Any help would be very appreciated.
>> > >
>> > > Cheers,
>> > > Raimund
>> >
>> > Hi Raimund,
>> > I guess you were the one to whom i was talking on IRC some days 
>> ago.
>> > I assured you to have a look at the source of VFS vfs_catia.c, 
>> because
>> > we were not able to get it working and it caught my inetrest, too.
>> >
>> > Also there is nearly NO info on the web about the usage of this
>> > re-written vfs module - the samba man page is useless (only old
>> > usage info)
>> >
>> > I now found the bug in vfs_catia.c and will push a fix soon.
>> > See http://pastie.org/6313997
>> > how it is working. One can specify translations for all
>> > invalid windows characters \ / : * ? " < > | and even
more ones.
>> >
>> > I hope this is the one you were looking for.  :-)
>> >
>> > Cheers, G?nter
>>
>> sorry, just a follow up.
>> I now used more invalid characters and also tried it with windows.
>> Linux and samba:
>> http://pastie.org/6314301
>>
>> Windows screenshot:
>> http://picpaste.com/pics/vfs_catia-pcvuDc44.1361505596.JPG
>>
>> Cheers, G?nter
>
> sorry, another follow-up...
>
> I've posted a patch to
>     
> https://lists.samba.org/archive/samba-technical/2013-February/090653.html
>
> Until i've updated the manual page for vfs_catia, use the following 
> in smb.conf:
>
> Note - "vfs objects = catia" can be used in both the [global] and
any
> other
> [share] section.
> Due to performance penalties i would not recommend to use it in 
> [global],
> but that's up to the user.
>
> Sample configuration:
>
> [someshare]
> 	vfs objects = catia
> # mapping is done:
> #	hex unix char : hex windows char
> #	comma is used to separate char mappings
> #	The following will map all invalid windows filename chars:
> #	"\ / : * ? " < > |"
> #	(plus the blank char, not always allowed with legacy clients)
> 	catia:mappings > 
>
0x22:0xa8,0x2a:0xa4,0x2f:0xf8,0x3a:0xf7,0x3c:0xab,0x3e:0xbb,0x3f:0xbf,0x5c:0xff,0x7c:0xa6,0x20:0xb1
> #
> #	Unix chars:
> #	0x22:  "
> #	0x2a:  *
> #	0x2f:  /
> #	0x3a:  :
> #	0x3c:  <
> #	0x3e:  >
> #	0x3f:  ?
> #	0x5c:  \
> #	0x7c:  |
> #	0x20:  blank char
> #	Windows chars (not listed here) !
>
> I hope this explains the usage.  :-)
This is exactly what I was looking for! Wonderful! Thanks so much!

Do I presume right that this is not part of the official Samba code? 
Will this patch work with Samba v3.5.10 or will I need a newer release?

Cheers,
Raimund