An apparatus and method for enabling users of network which have computers (100, 420, 430, 440, 450) running several different operating systems to access each others files easily. An algorithm is used to create legitimate, meaningful filenames by combining both a filename from a host (100) computer's "native" name space and a unique "inode" number from the host computer's file system (223) assigned for this file. The preliminary information necessary to apply the algorithm can be obtained rather easily, since the host computer's filename and inode number are returned by a well-known UNIX operating system call "getdents(2)". Client computers whose operating systems do not support a particular filename can both see and access a particular file via a special filename that is computed-on-the-fly; this name is not actually stored on the host computer (100) in either the file system or in a file, thereby eliminating a need for storing any additional information in the system. Using an inode number for computing the mapping of a long filename improves the uniqueness of resulting filenames, which is crucial if a client is dealing with large directories of files with similar names.