Editing File system (section)

=== File names ===

{{Main|Filename}}
A '''file name''', or '''filename''', identifies a file to consuming applications and in some cases users.

A file name is unique so that an application can refer to exactly one file for a particular name. If the file system supports directories, then generally file name uniqueness is enforced within the context of each directory. In other words, a storage can contain multiple files with the same name, but not in the same directory.

Most file systems restrict the length of a file name.

Some file systems match file names as [[Case sensitivity|case sensitive]] and others as case insensitive. For example, the names <code>MYFILE</code> and <code>myfile</code> match the same file for case insensitive, but different files for case sensitive.

Most modern file systems allow a file name to contain a wide range of characters from the [[Unicode]] character set. Some restrict characters such as those used to indicate special attributes such as a device, device type, directory prefix, file path separator, or file type.