Weird filename globbing in Windows

Can anyone explain this result?  (note: folder name has been obscured)

D:\...\exe\tds>dir *337*
 Volume in drive D has no label.
Volume Serial Number is 4279-DECE

Directory of D:\...\exe\tds

05/12/2011  02:39 PM        12,432,384 tds-8.0.324.0.exe
11/04/2011  02:41 PM        13,268,480 tds-8.0.337.0.exe
2 File(s)     25,700,864 bytes
0 Dir(s)  129,676,939,264 bytes free
D:\...\exe\tds>dir *337.0.exe
Volume in drive D has no label.
Volume Serial Number is 4279-DECE

Directory of D:\...\exe\tds

11/04/2011  02:41 PM        13,268,480 tds-8.0.337.0.exe
1 File(s)     13,268,480 bytes
0 Dir(s)  129,676,324,864 bytes free

I can’t figure out why tds-8.0.324.0.exe is matching *337*, in this folder.  There are lots of other files in the folder with similar names that don’t match.  chkdsk returned no errors.  Any ideas?

Update 4:45pm: I did a little more investigation.  The error can be reproduced on other computers, so it is not related to the state of the filesystem, or the path name.  The following command narrowed down the match a little:

c:\temp\tds>dir *d337*
Volume in drive C is OS
Volume Serial Number is 8036-7CEB

Directory of c:\temp\tds

12/05/2011  02:39 PM        12,432,384 tds-8.0.324.0.exe
1 File(s)     12,432,384 bytes
0 Dir(s)  12,700,200,960 bytes free

But the following did not match:

c:\temp\tds>dir td337*
Volume in drive C is OS
Volume Serial Number is 8036-7CEB

Directory of c:\temp\tds

File Not Found

Curiouser and curiouser.  Procmon did not provide much insight into the issue:

procmon

Where to now?  It’s Sunday afternoon, and I don’t feel like breaking out a kernel debugger to trace that any further right now.

Update 7:30pm: Well, I was puzzled so I did a little more research.  And ran across a mention of 8.3 filenames.  All of a sudden everything clicked into place.

D:\...\exe\tds>dir /x *337*
Volume in drive D has no label.
Volume Serial Number is 4279-DECE

Directory of D:\...\exe\tds

05/12/2011  02:39 PM        12,432,384 TDD337~1.EXE tds-8.0.324.0.exe
11/04/2011  02:41 PM        13,268,480 TDD938~1.EXE tds-8.0.337.0.exe
2 File(s)     25,700,864 bytes
0 Dir(s)  129,670,885,376 bytes free

Yes, even today DOS comes back to bite us.  So just beware when doing wildcard matches — especially with that old favourite del.

2 thoughts on “Weird filename globbing in Windows

  1. Marc,

    I seem to have experienced a research path similar to that of yours yesterday and today. And even a bit longer, as the problem first appeared to be somewhere inside of my own code (a utility merging “too many” files according to “o01*” wild card specification)…

    Yes, Microsoft keeps surprising us again and again 😉

    Best regards from Central Europe,

    Vlado B, 18:20 frozen time…

  2. Vlado,

    I’m sure this issue has caused much pain to many people! Sure, I can understand how and why and the complexity of resolving it, but it really is a nasty gotcha!

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