February 2nd, 2016

What happened to the ability to use … (three dots) to refer to the grandparent directory?

Raymond Chen
Raymond Chen

In Windows 95, you could type cd ... to go up two directories, or cd .... to go up three directories, and so on. (You could also use triple-dots in paths passed to functions like Create­File.) Where did this come from?

This interpretation of dots beyond two was introduced in Windows 95 for compatibility with the Novell NetWare redirector. Windows 95 came with a native Novell NetWare client, and one of the quirks of the Novell NetWare client is that it supported this dots beyond two feature. For compatibility, therefore, Windows 95 supported it as well. The parsing of the dots was done inside the Windows 95 installable file system component, so it was available to all file systems, not just NetWare volumes, but the intended audience for the feature was Novell NetWare clients.

Windows NT didn’t pick up this feature because, well, I don’t know. Maybe they thought it was a yucky hack. Actually, thinking more on it, it’s probably ... is a legal NT file name.

Category
Old New Thing
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History

Author

Raymond Chen

Raymond has been involved in the evolution of Windows for more than 30 years. In 2003, he began a Web site known as The Old New Thing which has grown in popularity far beyond his wildest imagination, a development which still gives him the heebie-jeebies. The Web site spawned a book, coincidentally also titled The Old New Thing (Addison Wesley 2007). He occasionally appears on the Windows Dev Docs Twitter account to tell stories which convey no useful information.

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