Windows/lanman shares ending with $ are invisible - where did this come from?

Asked Apr 04 '22 at 14:14

Active Apr 04 '22 at 15:57

Viewed 197 times

(Inspired by a comment in an answer about CLOCK$ which says: the 'symbols with a dollar sign are reserved to us' was also a DEC convention, certainly on RSX-11M systems)

In Windows, network shares that end with $ are not listed to connecting machines (for example, when use net view). This includes several pre-defined ones - ADMIN$, IPC$, C$ for C:\ etc. - and also custom shares. Presumably, this was also the case with LAN Manager, from which many Windows sharing mechanism inherit their behavior.

Where does this convention come from?

edited Apr 04 '22 at 15:57

user3840170

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asked Apr 04 '22 at 14:14

Jonathan

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Yes, this was also the case with LAN Manager, starting with 1.0; see for example this reference in the LAN Manager OS/2 Administrator Reference. – Stephen Kitt Apr 04 '22 at 14:29
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As a general comment, operating systems often come up with some convention for "this name is not generally interesting, so we'll hide it from listings". The dot convention in Unix, the H attribute for files in DOS, and the trailing-dollar-sign convention on Windows shares are all aspects of the same thing. – dave Apr 04 '22 at 17:13
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@another-dave with the caveat that the dot convention was an accident turned into a feature, not designed. – Stephen Kitt Apr 04 '22 at 18:08

Windows/lanman shares ending with $ are invisible - where did this come from?

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