Microsoft righted an age-old “wrong” (at least for those who geek out about disk formatting) earlier this week. With its latest Windows 11 Insider Canary Preview Build, the company increased the maximum FAT32 partition size limit from 32GB to 2TB when using the command line.
    • rdri@lemmy.worldEnglish
      0·
      3 months ago

      Linux still unable to catch up with NTFS when it comes to filename length, sadly. 256 bytes in an era of Unicode is ridiculous.

      • magic_smoke@links.hackliberty.orgEnglish
        0·
        3 months ago

        Linux might have a similar file name restriction, but what’s more important IMO, is the obnoxious file path restrictions NTFS has.

        Naming a file less than 255 chars is a lot easier than keeping its path down.

        Limiting file name is one thing, but dealing with limited path lengths when trying to move a custies folder full of subdir on subdirs is obnoxious when the share name its being transferred to makes it just too long.

        • fakeaustinfloyd@ttrpg.networkEnglish
          0·
          3 months ago

          Can’t you work around that with the extended length prefix of \\?\ (\\?\C:\whateverlongpathhere\)? Though admittedly, it is a pain in the ass to use.

          (edited for clarity and formatting)

        • rdri@lemmy.worldEnglish
          0·
          3 months ago

          True. Problem is, moving from more restricted system to less restricted system is a breeze, but painful otherwise. Linux is in a position where it would benefit from any little thing. People trying to switch to Linux will find path length feels like an upgrade, but file name limitation is clearly a downgrade.

            • rdri@lemmy.worldEnglish
              0·
              3 months ago

              I guess something like ようこそ『追放者ギルド』へ ～無能なＳランクパーティがどんどん有能な冒険者を追放するので、最弱を集めて最強ギルドを創ります～ 1 (ドラゴンコミックスエイジ) - 荒木 佑輔.epub - 92 characters, but 246 bytes. Where on Windows this file hits 35% of the limit, on Linux it hits 96%.

              The file is not some rare case. It’s from a torrent, uploaded somewhere just today. There are tons of files like this with slightly or much longer names. As of 2024, they can’t be served by Linux. Not in a pure file form, that is.

      • jabjoe@feddit.ukEnglish
        0·
        3 months ago

        NTFS also has a 255 limit, but it’s UTF16, so for unicode, you will get more out of it. High price to pay for UTF16. Windows basically is moving stuff between UTF16 and ASCII all the time. Most apps are ASCII but Windows is natively UTF16. All other modernly maintained OS do UTF8, which “won” unicode.

        The fact that all major Unix (not just Linux) filesystems are to 255 bytes says it’s not a feature in demand.

        I’d much rather have COW subvolume snapshotting and incremental backup of btrfs or zfs. Plus all the other things Linux has over Windows of course.

        • rdri@lemmy.worldEnglish
          0·
          3 months ago

          NTFS also has a 255 limit, but it’s UTF16, so for unicode, you will get more out of it.

          I think this is a biased way of putting it. NTFS way is easy to understand and therefore manage. What’s more important is that ASCII basically means English only. I’ve seen enough of such “discrimination” (stuff breaks etc.) based on used language in software/technology and it should end for good.

          All other modernly maintained OS do UTF8, which “won” unicode.

          UTF8 is Unicode. UTF8 symbols can take more than 1 byte.

          Plus all the other things Linux has over Windows of course.

          There are also encryption methods that slash maximum length of each filename even further.

          • jabjoe@feddit.ukEnglish
            0·
            3 months ago

            Of course UTF8 is Unicode. The cool thing about UTF8 is that is ASCII, until it isn’t. It cover all of Unicode, but doesn’t need any bloat if you are just doing latin characters. Plus UTF8 will seamless go through ASCII code and things that understand it do, others just have patches of jibberish, but still work otherwise. It’s a way better approach. Better legacy handling and more efficient packing for latin languages. Which is why it “won” out. UTF16 pretty much only exists in Windows because it’s legacy it will be hard for it to escape.

            LUKS is by far the most common encryption setup on Linux. It’s done at block layer and the filesystem doesn’t know about it. No effect of filename length, or anything else.

            • rdri@lemmy.worldEnglish
              0·
              3 months ago

              None of that helps or discards anything I’ve said above. But it allows to say that NTFS limit can be basically 1024 bytes. Just because you like what UTF-8 offers it doesn’t solve hurdles with Linux limits.

              LUKS is commonly used but not the only one.

              • jabjoe@feddit.ukEnglish
                0·
                3 months ago

                Linus’s VFS is where the 256 limit is hard. Some Linux filesystem, like RaiserFS, go way beyond it. If it was a big deal, it would be patched and widely spread. The magic of Linux, is you can try it yourself, run your own fork and submit patches.

                LUKS is the one to talk about as the others aren’t as good an approach in general. LUKS is the recommended approach.

                Edit: oh and NTFS is 512 bytes. UTF16 = 16bit = 2 bytes. 256*2 = 512

                • rdri@lemmy.worldEnglish
                  0·
                  3 months ago

                  The magic of Linux, is you can try it yourself, run your own fork and submit patches.

                  Well it should probably go further and offer more of another kind of magic - where stuff works as user expects it to work.

                  As for submitting patches, it sounds like you suggest people play around and touch core parts responsible for file system operations. Such an advice is not going to work for everyone. Open source software is not ideal. It can be ideal in theory, but that’s it.

                  LUKS is the one to talk about as the others aren’t as good an approach in general. LUKS is the recommended approach.

                  It looks like there are enough use cases where some people would not prefer LUKS.

      • Vilian@lemmy.caEnglish
        0·
        3 months ago

        Because it’s a shit filesystem and don’t have any advantage over, well, anything except being supported in Windows?

        • rdri@lemmy.worldEnglish
          0·
          3 months ago

          Linux file system is shit? Otherwise I don’t get why you’ve used the “because” word. NTFS is certainly not shit.

          • Vilian@lemmy.caEnglish
            0·
            3 months ago

            I re-read your comment and i completely misunderstood it sorry it’s 4am

  • BananaTrifleViolin@lemmy.worldEnglish
    0·
    3 months ago

    This is badly written and ignorant article. Fat32 supports up to 16Tb partition size (depending on cluster size - 2Tb -16Tb).

    Its microsoft’s windows tools that arbitrarily only allow users to create 32Gb partitions, and it is this that is being changed. This is not a change to Fat32, this is a change to windows. 3rd party tools on Windows and other systems like Linux have long offered more options for partition size.

    That its taken to 2024 for Microsoft to fix the command line tool (and still not fix the GUI tools) is ridiculous.

  • MrSoup@lemmy.zipEnglish
    0·
    3 months ago

    If someone still use win-dos, 4GB per file and 32GB partition cap is what they deserve.

  • OutrageousUmpire@lemmy.worldEnglish
    0·
    3 months ago

    I don’t know how much it matters though? If I try it on my Windows XP machine I’ll still be stuck with the old limit right?

  • /home/pineapplelover@lemm.eeEnglish
    0·
    3 months ago

    I think there was some kind of tool that let you extend it more. I had a 512gb drive on fat32 but it sucked so much I just reformated to ext4 and it performed much better

    • EddoWagt@feddit.nlEnglish
      0·
      3 months ago

      Yeah, GUIFormat can do that. Fat32 has its limitations, but I pretty much always use it as the stuff I use micro SD cards in, require it

  • Peffse@lemmy.worldEnglish
    0·
    3 months ago

    I love how the arstechnica article words it like you will never need FAT32 and it’s silly to consider it.

    I had to download fat32format I don’t know how many times because I needed to format an extra large SD Card or USB drive for some device. Microsoft really shafted exFAT’s adoption with their licensing.