Bryan wrote:
I work on a Mac and they work on a pc. I ran into a problem when I gave my clients my packaged InDesign files on dvd for their archives and to pull from for new publications. I had named some of the linked images with the “/” character, like when I was calling out a date, 09/26/07. But they are unable to copy these links to their harddrive because pc’s don’t recognize them!
Yes, unfortunately this has been a major problem since the 1980s, when people started moving pages from Mac to PC. DOS (and subsequently Windows) prohibits a number of special characters in file naming, including the slash. One Web page that explains the differences can be found here.
So the only good way around this is for you to rename those files. If you have a lot of files to rename (it sounds liked you do), you’ll probably want to use a file-renaming utilty. I see at VersionTracker.com that there are several available, including A Better Finder Rename from Public Space. I haven’t used this yet, but their site says it can “convert file names to Windows NTFS, SMB, DOS, Mac OS 9” which sounds promising.
Anne-Marie also responded to this issue, writing:
Well, you know even the Mac OS doesn’t like slashes… but the only character it won’t allow is the colon, which is used internally in the OS (also won’t allow periods at the start of filenames because that turns the file invisible, due to UNIX). Still, because of that UNIX thing, I never use slashes in filenames… it normally signifies a folder hierarchy, just like web sites (which often run on a UNIX OS).
So, while this isn’t good news for you, Bryan, I hope your pain will help others avoid the suffering you’re going through.
This article was last modified on December 18, 2021
This article was first published on September 27, 2007
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