[Flac] FLAC: file extension question

[Mark Rudholm]

Harry Sack wrote:
> 2007/4/7, Alex Jones <alex at weej.com>:
>>
>> On Sat, 2007-04-07 at 17:49 +0200, Harry Sack wrote:
>> > Hi,
>> >
>> > I have read somewhere there exist 2 extensions for FLAC files: .flac
>> > and .fla
>> > Why is this and what's the difference between them?
>>
>> Nothing. File name extensions don't mean anything. Don't be confused
>> into thinking that they do - they are simply part of the file name.
> 
> 
> 
> yes I know this, but my question is: why do they make different file
> extensions to FLAC files then if they mean nothing? (I had better 
> formulated
> my question like this)

Because some ancient DOS/Windows filesystems didn't support
filename extensions of more than three characters.  And this
limitation still ripples through the DOS/Windows/Microsoft
world.  There are many examples of this; htm vs. html, jpg
vs. jpeg, mpg vs. mpeg, etc, etc...