HELPLIB.HLB  —  Ext File Specs, Overview  Impact  Support Guidelines
    Under Extended File Specifications, existing applications and
    layered products that are coded to documented interfaces, as well
    as most DCL command procedures, should continue to work without
    modification.

    However, applications that are coded to undocumented interfaces,
    or include any of the following, may need to be modified in order
    to function as expected on an ODS-5 volume:

    o  Internal knowledge of the file system, including knowledge
       of:

          The data layout on disk
          The contents of file headers
          The contents of directory files

    o  File parsing tailored to a particular on-disk structure.

    o  Assumptions about the syntax of file specifications, such as
       the placement of delimiters and legal characters.

    o  Assumptions about the case of file specifications. Mixed
       and lowercase file specifications will not be converted to
       uppercase, which can affect string matching operations.

    o  Assumptions that file specifications are identical between RMS
       and the file system.

                                   NOTE

       All unmodified XQP applications running on an OpenVMS
       VAX or Alpha system that access an ODS-5 volume will see
       pseudonames returned in place of Unicode or ISO Latin-
       1 names that are not ODS-2 compliant. This can cause
       applications to act in an unpredictable manner.

       Applications that specify or retrieve filenames with the
       XQP interface using ODS-5 disks must be modified in order to
       access files with extended names.
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