File name character limitations lower than XP and Vista?
Hi All, So I've been editing some file names on an external drive with NTFS formatting. I've found that it will truncate the filename to 128 characters, regardless of the path length. This is significantly lower than What I can do in XP. Additionally, local files are limited to 230 character filenames. I believe I can get 260 out of Vista. I can live with the 230 limit, but the 128 limit on the external drive is killing me. Anyone know what settings need to be changed to get it to stop truncating (FYI, I can take the exact same external drive and plug it into my XP box and get 230 characters no problem) I did try an old XP trick of editing the registry and disabling the 8.3 name creation but that really did nothing. Thoughts?
May 13th, 2009 8:25pm

You can't be serious.Why would anyone need or want to have such massivelylong filenames?You8%!)$Juink58G$#JoJiB*&^lakqkall11lakglmvnahdllsdiwlandkj)($%kroanfgik$@!kslanLFKKSkksnaoenainelsklanfkthalnfa%^$583954873247BhiyRoghtiahldknaj.xxx.....that's a long filename.
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May 13th, 2009 10:25pm

You can't be serious. Why would anyone need or want to have such massivelylong filenames? Last time I checked, there were alot of functions in any O/S that some people used without having to justify them to other people who didn't use them. Generally it is somewhat unlike MS to remove functionality (but not always) from later releases of an O/S. But, since you asked, in my case, the reason I need such long filenames is in relation to a project we are doing here where we are ingesting audio files from our 10,000 CD library to a WAV format. As there is no standard for meta-data for WAV's, I have to include all of the data within the filename (I'm using EAC, which does this natively). When we purchase our new automation system, it will be able to strip this data from the filename and create its own metadata, at which point it will rename the files to a 8 charachter numeric code. But as you can now see, truncated filenames will cause problems populating the metadata. Since EAC is a fairly popular audio ripping program, I imagine I won't be the only user with this issue once Windows 7 ships.
May 13th, 2009 10:55pm

I meant no offense. I thought I asked a legitamate question.There might be some Group Policy settingin regards to your issue. I remember seeing a few folders relating to Filenames in the Policy trees: could be either in the Computer or User configurations, I don't remember which. Check it out maybe you'll find something.
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May 13th, 2009 11:22pm

I meant no offense. I thought I asked a legitamite question.I remember seeing some Group Policy settings that mayhave concern with your issue. They could be in either/both the Computer and/or User configurations. Check it out...maybe you'll find something.
May 13th, 2009 11:25pm

I meant no offense. I thought I asked a legitamite question. I remember seeing some Group Policy settings that mayhave concern with your issue. They could be in either/both the Computer and/or User configurations. Check it out...maybe you'll find something. Thanks for the suggestion. My apologies if I sounded offended. I tried granting myself full access under the security for the device settings but no luck, other than it took away the prompt that I was modifying files I didn't own. If it helps anyone troubleshooting this, I also tried checking the device manager, general system environment variables, folder options, user account control settings, and policies for the device. I'm plum out of ideas. Any other thoughts? Anyone? Thanks in advance
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May 14th, 2009 1:10am

I guess if you tinker with it long enough, you're bound to find it. I went in to regedit and under System -> Current Control Set -> Control -> FileSystem. Then right-clicked on NtfsAllowExtendedCharacter8dot3Rename selected "Modify" and changed the Value data from 0 to 1. The reboot and presto. Not sure why MS has this set to off by default, but one would think they would make a simpler way of changing this setting then going through a regedit. Generally MS doesn't encourage their users to "play under the hood" Oh well, glad there is some way to fix it, even if it is not intuitive.
May 14th, 2009 2:12am

I guess if you tinker with it long enough, you're bound to find it. I went in to regedit and under System -> Current Control Set -> Control -> FileSystem. Then right-clicked on NtfsAllowExtendedCharacter8dot3Rename selected "Modify" and changed the Value data from 0 to 1. The reboot and presto. Not sure why MS has this set to off by default, but one would think they would make a simpler way of changing this setting then going through a regedit. Generally MS doesn't encourage their users to "play under the hood" Oh well, glad there is some way to fix it, even if it is not intuitive. Well, thought I had it fixed, but alas, that is not the solution. Still running into the same issues on further testing. Anyone else have any ideas?
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May 14th, 2009 4:27am

I don't know if you understood what I meant by Group Policy.You'll have to use the Group Policy Editor. If you're using Windows 7 RC 7100 you should have access to it. With the RUN enabled in the Start Menu type in gpedit.msc. You'll see both Computer Configuration and User Configuration at the left upper corner of the window. The 4 different folders you need to look in are theWindows Settings and the Administrative Templates in both the Computer Configuration and User Configuration. Of course there are several other subfolders you need to look through as well. I know there's got to be something in there in regard to your issue with the filenames.I've seen several itemsin there regarding files, filenames,etc...you'll have to peek inside all of them.
May 14th, 2009 5:20am

I don't know if you understood what I meant by Group Policy. You'll have to use the Group Policy Editor. If you're using Windows 7 RC 7100 you should have access to it. With the RUN enabled in the Start Menu type in gpedit.msc. You'll see both Computer Configuration and User Configuration at the left upper corner of the window. The 4 different folders you need to look in are theWindows Settings and the Administrative Templates in both the Computer Configuration and User Configuration. Of course there are several other subfolders you need to look through as well. I know there's got to be something in there in regard to your issue with the filenames.I've seen several itemsin there regarding files, filenames,etc...you'll have to peek inside all of them. Thanks for the suggestion. Unfortunately, after alot of searching, I could find nothing in there that worked (though I did find lots of other interesting settings). As a side note, it looks like most, if not all of that stuff reflects settings in the registry. I'm assuming changes in there would modify the system registry. Guess it's back to XP for me until I can find a solution. Any other thoughts/suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks.
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May 14th, 2009 11:07pm

So, I've found a work-around that works (although it's terrible to have to do this just to get the same functionality as XP). If you run XP virtualization, you can add the remote drive and make the file name changes. Of course, then may as well be running XP, but at least it works. I would have thought at least one other person would have had issues with this and replied by now. Hmmmm, oh well :)
May 19th, 2009 2:39am

Some users will post a lot of information on the file name along for organizational purposes. Such as: [John Doe] 2010 September 15 - TPS report - Operations Division - TPS Reporting group.doc Make sense?Leonard Miyasato, CISSP, MCSE 2003 Email: EMAIL REMOVED
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September 10th, 2010 11:54pm

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