[dspillett]

> The only time I've ever seen this limitation being complained about, it's by people who've had problems with npm.

Recently that is where you'll have heard about it a lot, but people have been hitting the problem for years. I've hit it in a couple of distinct contexts in my time.

You hardly hear about it generally because people moan a bit then work around it so the problem goes away until next time, and sometimes people don't even moan about it because it is such an old problem they just think "oh, that again, better make my directory/file names and/or paths a bit shorter" and get on with their day.

The difference between this and with npm over recent times (causing the greater noise around the issue) is that twofold:

* linux/similar people hitting the problem in the wild for the first time (they've probably heard about it, but never had to deal with it) because their code is getting used on Windows which was much more a rare occurrence for them in the past, and being incredulous that such a problem exists in this decade

* Windows people wanting to use node and similar cool new tech on their preferred and/or mandated platform but hitting issues due to this problem in their environment (and in some cases being incredulous that someone wouldn't consider the implications of the limitation it in their design)