How can I ensure that my filenames don't get munged when burning a data DVD?

In particular, the following characters have all become _ (underscores):
& ( ) ,
These are unfortunately pretty common characters in an MP3 library (as well as locally-saved web pages, which have no ID3 tags).

I chose the UDF 1.02 format over Joliet specifically to preserve exact filenames, as well as long paths. I couldn't find any limitations in the UDF specification, the only illegal characters are supposed to be OS-dependent. Is the name-munging I'm seeing maybe an artifact of the software I used (BurnOn CD & DVD v3.1.0), or my operating system (Win98)?

To answer anticipated questions, I checked the disc with IsoBuster, so I know the names were written munged. I've got Win2k as well, it's just slightly more convenient to run in Win98 at the moment. I also have Nero 6 Express (OEM), which does not provide me any choice of filesystem format, just Joliet, which does the same munging. Can anyone confirm whether upgrading Nero would or would not solve my problem?

I use Win2k & Nero 6.6.0.6, and burning an UDF 1.02 DVD keeps all characters as they should be, always. I don't know where your problem lies exactly, but Win98 is at least supposed to have UDF support, but maybe there are some limitations as compared to newer versions.

Win98, most likely. I only keep a nearly barebones install of it for DOOM; that's the only thing it is good for these days. Try Win2000, put behind you the days when you had to reboot at least once a day to keep things running steady.

Get Doomsday/jDoom so you can get rid of Win98 completly

Also ZDoom and ZDoomGL!

http://www.doomworld.com/classicdoom/ports....php?platform=2

Ok... so the topic switched to Doom, fine... if you're looking for a list of Doom ports:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doom_source_port


Now about the underscore issue, "& ( )" -> "_" is a typical (plain) ISO9660 (Level 1+2) procedure. Seems like the UDF filesystem is not recognised by your system at all. Or wasn't even written to the disc for some reason, since Isobuster won't show the original Names either...

You could try to look for an alternative UDF driver for 98 (I think there might be something like this in existence...) and disable 98's own UDF support.

...or (I think that's the best solution) simply upgrade to Windows 2000 and also update Nero (while you're at it).

Concerning the original question:

I don't want to push linux but... in case you don't plan to upgrade your Windows, you could dual-boot with linux, which handles UDF read/write natively. As a bonus you could also enable the Rock Ridge when burning your CD/DVD's, which adds 255-character filenames and various other features

Edit: forgot to mention, that Rock Ridge is an IEEE standard - and honestly it works very well.

Original poster, here.

The BurnOn software was at fault; trial edition of Nero 7 works perfectly, so I'll be purchasing that. Even with UDF 1.02 (default setting), the resulting disc is readable by both W2K and W98, with no path or filename alterations. Caveat though that UDF-only must be written to the disc! Attempting a UDF/ISO hybrid still truncated the file names, even in the UDF table of contents.

Thanks to everyone who replied with helpful suggestions.

Nice !

Be careful if you have any filenames with accents though; because windows 98 has various issues with unicode...

Maybe you could try burning a file on cd-rw under windows 98, with a name such as: éèàééèà.mp3, and try reading it on a windows 2000 box... just to be sure