HP OpenVMS Systems

Wildcards in DCL command?

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The Question is:

 
One day I was typing to quickly and instead of doing a $dir *.sav;* I typed in
 $*.sav;* and hit return.  The system responded with "Waiting to tune system .
 . ." at which point I immediately panicked of course, did a few control y's
 and got back to the $
prompt.  But the question remains - What was the system trying to do?
 

The Answer is :

 
  Look for a file $*.* in your DCL$PATH.
 
  If the command input is unrecognized as a DCL verb or as a symbol, then
  the DCL$PATH mechanism will activate and will attempt to match the input
  against a filename, and it accepts wildcards.  DCL looks for a filename
  matching the input with a default file specification of DCL$PATH:.COM
  first, then again with a default file specification of DCL$PATH:.EXE.
 
  For example, if you have A.COM and B.COM in an otherwise empty directory,
  then the DCL command * will invoke A.COM.  For entertainment purposes,
  you can enter the command DEFINE * B.COM, and then the command input *
  will invoke B.COM.
 

  

     

     
answer written or last revised on ( 8-MAR-2001 )
     
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