diff --git a/docs/releasenotes.html b/docs/releasenotes.html
index f40efa642..93e3da825 100644
--- a/docs/releasenotes.html
+++ b/docs/releasenotes.html
@@ -124,6 +124,9 @@
         <li class="body">Added filters for audit events (partially fulfills request 559103).
           A SuppressionFilter denies events according to a suppressions file (request 756416).</li>
 
+        <li class="body">Made basedir property of Checker OS agnostic
+        (request 663149).</li>
+
       </ul>
 
       <p class="body">
diff --git a/src/checkstyle/com/puppycrawl/tools/checkstyle/Checker.java b/src/checkstyle/com/puppycrawl/tools/checkstyle/Checker.java
index 1d2de0439..82c5fc11c 100644
--- a/src/checkstyle/com/puppycrawl/tools/checkstyle/Checker.java
+++ b/src/checkstyle/com/puppycrawl/tools/checkstyle/Checker.java
@@ -36,6 +36,8 @@ import com.puppycrawl.tools.checkstyle.api.LocalizedMessage;
 import com.puppycrawl.tools.checkstyle.api.MessageDispatcher;
 import com.puppycrawl.tools.checkstyle.api.SeverityLevel;
 
+import org.apache.tools.ant.util.FileUtils;
+
 /**
  * This class provides the functionality to check a set of files.
  * @author Oliver Burn
@@ -291,7 +293,17 @@ public class Checker extends AutomaticBean
     /** @param aBasedir the base directory to strip off in filenames */
     public void setBasedir(String aBasedir)
     {
-        mBasedir = aBasedir;
+        // we use getAbsolutePath() instead of getCanonicalPath()
+        // because normalize() removes all . and .. so path
+        // will be canonical by default.
+        mBasedir =
+            FileUtils.newFileUtils().normalize(aBasedir).getAbsolutePath();
+    }
+
+    /** @return the base directory property used in unit-test. */
+    String getBasedir()
+    {
+        return mBasedir;
     }
 
     /** notify all listeners about the audit start */
diff --git a/src/tests/com/puppycrawl/tools/checkstyle/CheckerTest.java b/src/tests/com/puppycrawl/tools/checkstyle/CheckerTest.java
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..9b70cc965
--- /dev/null
+++ b/src/tests/com/puppycrawl/tools/checkstyle/CheckerTest.java
@@ -0,0 +1,34 @@
+package com.puppycrawl.tools.checkstyle;
+
+import java.io.File;
+
+import junit.framework.TestCase;
+
+public class CheckerTest extends TestCase
+{
+    public void testDosBasedir() throws Exception
+    {
+        Checker c = new Checker();
+
+        c.setBasedir("c:/a\\b/./c\\..\\d");
+        assertEquals("C:\\a\\b\\d", c.getBasedir());
+    }
+
+    public void testOsBasedir() throws Exception
+    {
+        Checker c = new Checker();
+
+        // we need something to create absolute path
+        // let's take testinputs.dir
+        String testinputs_dir = System.getProperty("testinputs.dir");
+
+        if (!testinputs_dir.endsWith(File.separator)) {
+            testinputs_dir += File.separator;
+        }
+
+        c.setBasedir(testinputs_dir + "indentation/./..\\coding\\");
+
+
+        assertEquals(testinputs_dir + "coding", c.getBasedir());
+    }
+}