WP renaming image name strangely

It’s called a sanitized file name. When you upload a file, WP checks if there are possible not allowed file extensions within(!) the filename, and adds a trailing underscore to that part of the file name.

Here the “.cote” is such a not allowed file extensions, so it is sanitized to “.cote_”

See lines 2079-2099 of https://developer.www.ads-software.com/reference/functions/sanitize_file_name/
(“Loop over any intermediate extensions. Postfix them with a trailing underscore if they are a 2 – 5 character long alpha string not in the allowed extension list.”)

So I?suppose it’s relative of the length of the word after a “.”. Too small and it’s considered as a possible file extension.

Yes, correct.
Any “.” followed by 2-5 letters (a-z, A-Z) will get an “_“.
But only if those detected possible file extension is not in the list of the allowed extension.

So an uploaded file with the name
test.exe.pdf.a.ab.abc.abcd.abcde.abcdef.png
will become
test.exe_.pdf.a.ab_.abc_.abcd_.abcde_.abcdef.png

In detail:

• .exe: not allowed → becomes .exe_
• .pdf: allowed
• .a and .abcdef: not detected as extensions
• .ab, .abc, .abcd, .abcde: not allowed → _ added

Thanks for these clear explanations.