Re: (make-pathname :name "/root") - good/bad?

+ Geoffrey King <lordergeoffrey@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>:

| In CLISP (windows):
| (make-pathname :name "root") ; --> #p"root"
| (make-pathname :name "/root") ; --> error
|
| The error is:
| *** - MAKE-PATHNAME: illegal :NAME argument "/root"
|
| If it makes a difference i don't have a directory called /root.

In addition to the other responses, I may add that, if you really want
this pathname to point to a directory called root as opposed to an
ordinary file of that name, you probably want this:

(make-pathname :directory (list :absolute "root")) ; => #P"/root/"

That said, you may also wish to look at Peter Seibel's portable
pathname library:

http://gigamonkeys.com/book/practical-a-portable-pathname-library.html

That is, if you're trying to solve a real-world problem rather than
just asking academic questions about standards conformance. 8-)

--
* Harald Hanche-Olsen <URL:http://www.math.ntnu.no/~hanche/>
- It is undesirable to believe a proposition
when there is no ground whatsoever for supposing it is true.
-- Bertrand Russell
.