Introduction:
This guide is an introduction to the file naming conventions you will see used when using ssTek. As the already well-established release groups had long ago discovered, a filename can contain a ton of info. So it's important how we structure or format our database-like filenames.
Indexing Structures, Filing Systems, and Character Sets:
With any large amount of information, it is important for the people accessing it to have some kind of structure to navigate their way to the information they're looking for. If there is no structure for locating specific data, the collection of information is virtually useless and the task of finding what you are looking for becomes like trying to find a needle in a haystack.
For this reason, a relatively new convention was developed for the naming of files. This naming convention was formally ratified by many - if not most - of the well known release groups. The use of these standards, along with the files they are attached to, have trickled down to the P2P community, and now to us here at ssTek.
Rules for naming files and folders are an important part of the standards. Correctly named folders make it easier to maintain clean archives and unique filenames are necessary to allow any duplicate checker program to work properly.
Also, since FTP servers, operating systems, or file systems may not allow special characters in file or directory names, only a small set of characters is allowed. And substitutions are made where special characters would normally be used (e.g. ç replaced by c); or these characters are simply omitted, such as an asterisk(*).
So in order to minimize the problems due to the many platforms a release may encounter during its distribution, a very specifically defined character set is used in naming of the files and folders. This ubiquitous character set includes the upper- and lower-case English alphabet, numerals, and several basic punctuation marks. It is outlined below:
ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
0123456789'!+-,._()[]
The Absence of Spaces:
Since spaces are explicitly disallowed in all current standards, the first thing you'll see is a lot of dots; or full stops if you insist on using the 20th century term for them. Get used to it and learn to love 'em.
The reason you see dots instead of spaces (Kind.Of.Like.This) is because different operating systems and software read spaces in different ways. For example, even in simple HTML, a space can often be automatically converted to %20, depending on why kind of software you're using to read it and how well that software converts the encoded text into human-readable text.
Rather than making people decipher file%20names%20like%20this%20which%20are%20hard%20to%20read, the dots make file.names.like.this.much.easier.to.read.
Spaces in file names can also cause broken links, because word processing tools like Microsoft Word, and e-mail clients like Microsoft Outlook, recognize spaces as an opportunity to move to another line. Therefore, a link to
\\Ah1\Intranet\ar\naming conventions
could become
\\Ah1\Intranet\ar\naming
conventions
Another difference that is found among operating systems and software is the acceptable length of file names. Some systems allow up to 256 characters, while others allow far fewer.
And finally many scripts/batch/cmd files would require filenames with spaces to be enclosed in double-quotes otherwise the spaces are interpreted as parameter breaks much like what the word processing tools would do to them.
Tagging Convention:
First the syntax. (NOTE: The following should be considered all one file or folder name):
[<Publisher>.]<Title>_v<Version>|c<Year>[_<Language>][_<OS>][_<Architecture>][_<LicenseType>]_<BuildType>[_<Category>|<Additional>][_<Releaser>]
Yes, this does look very cryptic and daunting but fear not, that's what you have this guide for. A couple things you should know about the syntax are follows:
Here, we'll try to walk you through some of the most important parts of our file-naming standard:
Examples:
Finally, to help illustrate some of the rules, we present a few examples of what properly formatted filenames would look like:
7-Zip_v9.25Beta_x64_ssApp_bphlpt.apz
Bulk.Rename.Utility_v2.7.1.1_ppApp.apz
CCleaner_v2.36.1233_ppApp.apz
Elaborate.Bytes.Virtual.CloneDrive_v5.4.4.0_ssApp.apz
HashCheck.Shell.Extension_v2.1.11.1_ssApp_Addon.apz
Ben.There,Dan.That!_c2008_ppGame_Adventure_TheFreezerBox.pgz
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