Techniques for handling letter case in file systems

A system comprising:

• one or more processors;
• and
• one or more storage units comprising a file system that includes one or more directories each containing one or more files and/or one or more directories, the file system executable by the one or more processors to:
• receive a request to perform a file system operation, the request including a path name with a first component that identifies a directory and a second component that identifies a file name;
• determine that a case sensitive match does not exist in the directory for the file name identified by the second component of the path name;
• based on a determination that the directory is assigned a case insensitive designation, determine that a case insensitive match exists between the file name identified by the second component of the path name and a file name associated with a file contained in the directory;
• and
• based on a determination that the case sensitive match does not exist in the directory and that the case insensitive match exists between the file name identified by the second component of the path name and the file name associated with the file contained in the directory, perform the file system operation in association with the file contained in the directory, wherein the file name associated with the file contained in the directory is designated as a preferred case insensitive match so the file system operation is performed on the file rather than one or more other files in the directory that also have one or more corresponding file names that are case insensitive matches.

A system comprising:

• one or more processors;
• and
• one or more storage units comprising a file system that includes one or more directories each containing one or more files and/or one or more directories, the file system executable by the one or more processors to:
• receive an instruction to associate a first designation with a first directory in the file system and to associate a second designation with the second directory in the file system, the instruction generated based on user input, wherein:
• the first designation indicates that the first directory is prohibited from containing two or more files with case varying duplicate file names and the second designation indicates that the second directory is allowed to contain two or more files with case varying duplicate file names;
• and
• the user input is provided via a user account or a group account listed in an access control list associated with the first directory and the second directory, the access control list defining user accounts or group accounts that have permission to designate the first directory as a directory that is prohibited from containing the two or more files with the case varying duplicate file names;
• associate, based at least in part on the instruction, the first designation with the first directory;
• receive a request to create a first file with a first file name in the first directory, the first file name being a first case varying duplicate file name of a first existing file name in the first directory;
• prevent, based at least in part on the first designation, creation of the first file in the first directory;
• associate, based at least in part on the instruction, the second designation with the second directory;
• receive a request to create a second file with a second file name in the second directory, the second file name being a second case varying duplicate file name of a second existing file name in the second directory;
• and
• allow, based at least in part on the second designation, creation of the second file in the second directory.