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Which characters in filenames cause iCloud document sync issues?
Apple's iCloud File Management documentation says to "avoid special punctuation or other special characters" in filenames, but doesn't specify which characters. I need a definitive list to implement filename sanitization in my shipping app. Confirmed issues Our iOS app (CyberTuner, App Store, 15 years shipping on App Store) manages .rcta files in the iCloud ubiquity container via NSFileManager APIs. We've confirmed two characters causing sync failures: Ampersand (&): A file named Yamaha CP70 & CP80.rcta caused repeated "couldn't be backed up" dialogs. ~12 users reported this independently. Replacing & resolved it immediately. No other files in the same directory were affected. Percent (%): A file with % in the filename was duplicated by iCloud sync (e.g., filename% 1.rcta, filename% 2.rcta), and the original was lost. Currently reproducing across multiple devices. Both characters have special meaning in URL encoding (% is the escape character, & is the query parameter separator), which suggests the issue may be in URL handling within the sync pipeline. What I'm looking for: A definitive list of characters that cause problems in the iCloud sync pipeline specifically — not APFS restrictions, but CloudDocs/FileProvider/server-side issues. Confirmation whether these characters are problematic: & % # ? + / : * " < > | Is there a system API for validating or sanitizing filenames for iCloud compatibility before writing to the ubiquity container? Our users are piano technicians who naturally name files "Steinway & Sons" — we need to know exactly what to sanitize rather than guessing. Environment: iOS 17–26, Xcode 26.1, APFS, NSFileManager ubiquity container APIs Bundle FEEDBACK ASSISTANT ID FB21900837
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