If you have arrived at UNIX via DOS or some other personal computer operating system, you will notice some big differences. UNIX is, was, and always will be a multiuser operating system. It is a multiuser operating system even when you're the only person using it. It is a multiuser operating system even when it is running on a PC with a single keyboard. And this fact has important ramifications for everything that you do. more...
Traditionally, Unix/Linux/POSIX filenames can be almost any sequence of bytes, and their meaning is unassigned. The only real rules are that "/" is always the directory separator, and that filenames can't contain byte 0 (because this is the terminator). Although this is flexible, this creates many unnecessary problems. In particular, this lack of limitations makes it unnecessarily difficult to write correct programs (enabling many security flaws), makes it impossible to consistently and accurately display filenames, causes portability problems, and confuses users. more ....
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