Re: OS X and umlauts in file names

Thomas Singer wrote:

I'm on an English OS X 10.6.2 and I created a sample file with umlauts in
its name (Überlänge.txt). When I try to stage the file in the terminal, I
can't complete the file name by typing the Ü and hitting the tab key, but I
can complete it by typing an U and hitting the tab key. Unfortunately, after
executing

 git stage Überlänge.txt

This is because of OS X's unicode normalisation.  Try any of the
many threads on the topic, e.g.,

  http://thread.gmane.org/gmane.comp.version-control.git/70688

The short version is that this Ü is in fact decomposed into an
U-umlaut duo.

Considering that this leads to endless fun[*] not just with git, and
that we German speakers have an easy way out (Ueberlaenge), I can only
suggest that you avoid umlauts wherever possible to preserve
the sanity of your users.


[*] I once had an SVN repo with two different directories both called
Übungen.  Took me a while to figure out what was going on.

-- 
Thomas Rast
trast@{inf,student}.ethz.ch