Re: Long file names in Dired

[Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>]

> From: Marcin Borkowski <mbork@mbork.pl>
> Date: Fri, 24 Apr 2015 01:10:24 +0200
> 
> so I have some really, really long filenames (say, more than 70
> characters), and I'd like to shorten them so they don't spill to the
> next line in Dired.  I can toggle-truncate-lines, of course, but then
> I don't see the extension, and I'd prefer to truncate the part /before/
> the extension.
> 
> Is there any Dired hack enabling this?

Not that I know of (but others might, so don't consider that as a
definitive answer).

One obvious way to show long file names is to have wider
frames/windows.

Failing that, I think we will welcome a patch that shortens file names
in Dired intelligently, basically displaying something like
foo...bar.ext, with the place of the ellipsis strategically computed
to show as much of the file name as possible, including the extension.

If you, or someone else, decide to work on that, beware of the fact
that Dired puts a special text property on the file name, which is
needed for correct operation of Dired commands when the file names
include special characters, like whitespace.  You should be careful
not to destroy this subtle feature.