A.P. Lawrence

This article is from a FAQ concerning SCO operating systems. While some of the information may be applicable to any OS, or any Unix or Linux OS, it may be specific to SCO Xenix, Open Desktop or Openserver.

There is lots of Linux, Mac OS X and general Unix info elsewhere on this site: Search this site is the best way to find anything.

OSR5 FAQ

Why do I have files with "#" as part of the name?

Posted by Roberto Zini to c.u.s.m. Feb 5 2001

  >Our SCO system appears to have a lot of seemingly duplicated files with
  ># signs in their names.  Example:

  
  >temp
  >temp#
  >temp##
  >
  >and so on.
  >
  >What are these?  Can I get rid of them?

These files get created when you perform a software/system verify by making use of the custom command and force the system to fix any discrepancies found; the trailing "#" characters simply inform you that file was changed during that procedure (eg, "temp" is the actual file and it should be the good one - well, according to the internal database - while "temp#" and "temp##" are old copies of the same files BUT with incorrect ownerships/permissions/symlinks).

The system just adds a trailing "#" to give you the ability to tell/examine/inspect the differences between the old and the new file.

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