[R-SIG-Mac] testing/asserting case sensitivity

[Kirill Müller]

Would it be an option for you to use a case-insensitive 
mount/subdirectory on your Linux system?


Best regards

Kirill


On 17.01.2026 21:57, Ben Bolker wrote:
>   I have a problem/annoyance with students who are working on MacOS 
> and sharing Git repositories with data file and code where the strings 
> used in their code to designate the data files are not case-matched to 
> the actual names of the files on disk.  They don't notice this because 
> they're using a case-insensitive file system on MacOS, but it bites me 
> when I try to run the code on my Linux system.
>
>   I can of course tell them to be more careful, but: is there any kind 
> of programmatic check for this that they could use when testing their 
> code before submission? (Students are not super-technically savvy, so 
> telling them to adjust the properties of their file systems, even if 
> it's something that's possible, is not a realistic option; neither is 
> telling them to use GitHub Actions to run checks elsewhere ...)
>
>   I'm imagining (ideally) some kind of _CHECK_CASE_STRICTLY_ 
> environment variable/options setting/etc., but I'd be interested in 
> any creative solutions.
>
>   Tangentially related:
>
> https://www.reddit.com/r/MacOS/comments/1ha36y5/macos_apfs_caseinsensitive_and_handling_git_repo/ 
>
>
>   cheers
>    Ben Bolker
>
>