Path: csiph.com!v102.xanadu-bbs.net!xanadu-bbs.net!eternal-september.org!feeder.eternal-september.org!news.swapon.de!fu-berlin.de!uni-berlin.de!individual.net!not-for-mail From: Bob Eager Newsgroups: comp.misc Subject: Re: Why Windows Uses Backslashes and Everything Else Uses Forward Slashes Date: 1 Nov 2014 11:14:08 GMT Lines: 30 Message-ID: References: <9nujl7i4uQPFgYpYpcnealDq@dont-email.me> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit X-Trace: individual.net 4oIf4yTdpQ24KKKcV/NjgQUWQ2fpXbE1IsDWsvArLsAjqlkTkM Cancel-Lock: sha1:NT8h/7WqytUWpl62F6qEJuRr+HY= User-Agent: Pan/0.135 (Tomorrow I'll Wake Up and Scald Myself with Tea; GIT 30dc37b master) Xref: csiph.com comp.misc:5497 On Sat, 01 Nov 2014 03:29:33 +0000, Rich wrote: > http://www.howtogeek.com/181774/why-windows-uses-backslashes-and- everything-else-uses-forward-slashes/?PageSpeed=noscript > > Have you ever noticed that it's C:\Windows\ in Windows, > http://howtogeek.com/ on the web, and /home/user/ on Linux, OS X, and > Android? Windows uses backslashes for paths, while everything else > seems to use forward slashes. > > Modern software tries to automatically correct you when you type the > wrong type of slash, so it doesn't matter which type of slash you use > most of the time. But, sometimes, the difference still matters. > > So why is Windows the odd operating system out? It's all down to a > few accidents of history that happened decades ago. > > ... That doesn't really go back far enough. DOS took the / switch convention from CP/M - they didn't 'design' it. And CP/M almost certainly took it from DEC - on PDP-8, PDP-10, etc. -- Using UNIX since v6 (1975)... Use the BIG mirror service in the UK: http://www.mirrorservice.org