How to test if two strings point to the same file or directory?

[Tim Chase]

>>> Comparing file system paths as strings is very brittle. Is there a
>>> better way to test if two paths point to the same file or directory
>>> (and that will work across platforms?)
>> 	os.path.samefile(filename1, filename2)
>> 	os.path.sameopenfile(fileobject1, fileobject2)
> 
> Nice try, but they don't "work across platforms".

Okay...double-checking the docs.python.org writeup, it apparently 
does "work across platforms" (Mac & Unix), just not "across *all* 
platforms", with Win32 being the obvious outlier.  It seems a 
strange omission from Win32 python, even if it were filled in 
with only a stub...something like

	def samefile(f1, f2):
		return abspath(f1.lower()) == abspath(f2.lower())

it might not so gracefully handle UNC-named files, or SUBST'ed 
file-paths, but at least it provides an attempt at providing the 
functionality on win32.  As it currently stands, it would be 
entirely too easy for a [Mac|*nix] programmer to see that there's 
a samefile() function available, use it successfully based on its 
docstring, only to have it throw an exception or silently fail 
when run on win32.

-tkc