[QE-developers] proper directory delimiters under windows

[Josh Lipton-Duffin]

Dear QE Developers,

I am a longtime 'dabbler' in QE, having not used the program in too much depth other than a few geometry optimisations. Up until recently I have always interacted with the package over a unix-like HPC cluster, but have recently found it convenient to run small jobs on a windows desktop.

I am using the precompiled binaries (v6.3), and I have noticed that when composing the input file one must specify paths to output files, pseudopotentials, etc using the unix-style forward slash "/", eg

pseudo_dir  = "C:/Users/me/QE/pseudos"

however, this is syntactically incorrect on windows operating systems, as the accepted convention should use a backslash as a directory separator, eg.

pseudo_dir  = "C:\Users\me\QE\pseudos"

The real problem I am having is that Burai, the nice GUI from Japan will construct the input files using the latter convention; however, when pw.exe receives an input file with this structure it throws an error, unable to parse the directory. This isn't a problem for Burai on mac or linux platforms, since their directory delimiter is the same as unix.

Is it possible to have the windows binary (or, indeed all versions) to recognise either a backslash or a forward slash in the input file as a directory delimiter? I can see where this might cause problems in escaping characters properly, but from an end-user standpoint it would be easier to move input files across different platforms if either character would work.

Best regards from Australia,
-jld

--
Assoc. Professor Josh Lipton-Duffin  |  Principal Research Fellow for Surface Science
Institute for Future Environments (IFE) | Central Analytical Research Facility (CARF)
Queensland University of Technology (QUT)
Address: Level 6, P Block, Gardens Point campus, 2 George St Brisbane QLD 4000
Tel: +61 7 3138 0762 | |  Email: josh.liptonduffin at qut.edu.au | Web: www.qut.edu.au/ife/carf
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