Glossary - S        A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S  T U V W X

Search Path - A semicolon-delimited list of directories in which to search for a file.

Secondary Shell - A copy of the command processor which is started by another program, rather than by the operating system.

Section - A part of an Initialization File starting with a section name enclosed in brackets, e.g., [primary].

Session - A general term for the individual windows or tasks started by a multitasking system.

Shell - The name used in UNIX/Linux/etc. systems for command processor, from a pictorial representation of the OS being encased by a shell.. Also used to refer to any program which gives access to operating system functions and features through a menu- or mouse-driven system, or which replaces the primary user interface of the operating system.

Short File Name (SFN) - A file name which follows the rules of the FAT file system:  a name of 0 ..8 characters and an extension of 0 .. 3 characters, each consisting of only alphabetic and numeric characters plus the punctuation marks ! # $ % & ' ( ) - @ ^ _ ` { } and ~. See also LFN.

VFAT file systems consider a file name that contains a lower case character to be a LFN, even if it obeys all other rules to a SFN, and assign to it a SFN - the all upper case version of the LFN. NTFS does not assign an SFN to such files.

When you copy an LFN file to another LFN directory by its LFN (using the same name in the target directory), the SFN of the target file may be different from the SFN of the source file.        

Size Range - A TCC feature which allows you to select files based on their size. For details see Size Ranges.

Soft Link - also known as a directory junction or reparse point - is a special file. When created, its content is the name of a directory on any volume. Any reference to the contents of the soft link act on the contents of the directory it references, including deleting of files from the soft link, which deletes the files from the referenced directory.

Soft links can be chained, i.e., a soft link A can refer to another soft link B. Changing the referenced directory of B effectively changes the contents of A.

If the directory referenced by a soft link is deleted, references to the soft link's contents fail. If later another directory is created with the same name, the soft link will function again. Similarly, if the reference is to a removable volume, it will reference whatever volume is present at the time of access.

Source - In file processing commands (e.g. COPY or MOVE), the original files before any copying or modification has taken place, i.e., those specified earlier on the command line. See also Destination.

Stack - An area of memory used by any program to store temporary data while the program is running; more generally, any such storage area where the last item stored is normally the first one removed.

Standard Error (stderr)- The file or character device where a program displays error messages. It defaults to the screen. It may be redirected to a file, or piped to another program.

Standard Input (stdin) - The file or character device whence a program obtains its normal input. It defaults to the keyboard. It may be redirected to a file, or piped to another program.

Standard Output (stdout) - The file or character device where a program displays its normal output. It defaults to the screen. It may be redirected from a file, or piped from another program.

Stderr - short for Standard Error.

Stdin - short for Standard Input.

Stdout - short for Standard Output.

Subdirectory - Any directory other than the root directory.

Subtree - See Directory Tree.

Switch - Alternate name for Option; also the name of the program control command SWITCH.

System - A file attribute indicating that the file belongs to the operating system, and should not be accessed by other programs. Most files with this attribute also has the Hidden attribute.