Part 1 | Part 2 If you look at the various components in your
computer, the hard disk is typically the slowest. This means
that disk I/O can become a major bottleneck Back in the days of
DOS, the file system of choice was FAT (file allocation table).
The FAT file system limited the length of a filename to eight
characters plus a three character extension. Newer file systems
such as FAT32 and NTFS allow the use of long filenames, but they
also retain a FAT-style filename for backward compatibility
purposes. This filename alias can cause performance problems in
a couple of different ways. First, the process of writing the
filename alias consumes disk I/O cycles. Also, the filename
alias forces the operating system to stop and calculate what the
abbreviated filename should be. That in itself incurs a minor
performance hit. The real problem, though, is in the way that
the filename alias is calculated. To create a filename alias,
Windows looks at the first six characters of the original
filename and then derives t