>Well, no - I'm not confused over case sensitivity in data vs. a programming language, at all. I was originally discussing it in a language. You added data to the mix with your example of an exec looking for a file (which is data). I replied in kind, showing that you can run into case-sensitivity problems in data, whether the language you use is case-sensitive or not.
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>Windows is no different from *n?x, under the hood. Symbols are stored and manipulated via distinct strings. *n?x started out by programmers, for programmers. MS-DOS was always aimed at the mass market i.e. end-users; MS decided to implement a limited UI case-insensivity, which they compatibly carried over into Windows.
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>I think we're agreed that case-insensitivity is useful for end-users, but it takes effort to do that, its definition is arbitrary and it doesn't solve the bigger search problem that Google makes so much money working on.
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>In programming, speaking for myself, I find case-sensitivity costs me nothing. I copy/paste symbol names as much as possible. I don't have to mentally switch gears when using a case-sensitive language.
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>It's not that the world is case-insensitive, and language/OS designers decided to "add" case-sensitivity - it's the other way around. If you want to "solve" the case-sensitivity "problem" at its root, you have to find some way to have various ambiguous/sloppy/"human" representations always point to the exact symbol the user (or programmer) is looking for. A DWIMNWIS function, or a Googlewhack every time.

I added the Linux thing to indicate how frustrating it is for not only programmers to get tripped up by stupid stuff like case, which is meaningless, but also for users on things like file names. Just like total should not be different from Total in source code, MyBigPresentation.doc should not be different from mybigpresentation.doc when the user is searching for it. It's nice to have consistency in source code, but there is really no good argument for case sensitivity. If someone wrote you a note calling you al doman, would you toss it out because you figured it wasn't you? A name conveys a concept of a person or item or entity or var name or whatever. The case of the has no bearing on the concept. That's the way our brains work and computers should not work against that flow, they should go with it.

Your examples brought different languages into the conversation, which is an entirely different subject.