The disc address is used internally by the ADFS to find the file on the disc's
surface, and it is not usually of interest to users. Directories have only their disc
address displayed, the other information being meaningless.
A special form of the *EX command, *LEX, exists to produce detailed
information about files in the CSL.
Wildcards
The ADFS supports a facility for using special characters, known as wildcards
in filenames. These characters can be used to specify an ambiguous filename
which can match several real names and thus perform actions on several files
with only one command. The single character wildcard '#' indicates one
unspecified character, whilst the multiple character wildcard is '*'. Examples of
filenames incorporating wildcards are:
Chapter# (e.g. 'Chapterl', 'ChaptertG')
DAY ## (e.g. 'DAYaa', 'DAY36')
$. LETTERS . * (any file in '$.LETTERS')
PHYSICS .*Joules* (any filename in 'PHYSICS' with 'Joules' in it)
The way in which filenames incorporating wildcards are interpreted depends
on the command with which they are used. Most commands will act on the first
file that satisfies the given wildcard pattern in alphabetical order. The *CAT
command works like this so, for example:
*CAT Q*
will catalogue the first directory in the CSD that begins with a 'Q' or a 'q'
(remember the ADFS takes no notice of the case of letters).
Other commands will act on all filenames which match the pattern, for
example *INFO. Thus:
*INFO Chapter*
will display information about all files whose names begin with 'Chapter'.
A third group of commands do not permit wildcards at all, and they produce the
'Wildcards' error message if you try to employ them. Such a command is
*DELETE, which we shall come to shortly.
Access codes and the *ACCESS command
*CAT, *INFO and their associated commands print letters between the
filename and the sequence number which describe the kind of operations
permitted on the file. There are five such possible letters, each of which may be
'set' (and therefore printed by *CAT/*INFO) or 'unset' (and not printed):
F 15