Interesting. Obviously a bad example for that strain of Linux, but still a valid example for mainstream unix.
In unix when the links count for a file is greater than value 1 this signifies a hard link. Possible to try some likely directories (like /bin) and sort by links count to see if there are any:
Hi all!
I'd like to know the differences between hard links and soft links. I've already read the ln manpage, but i'm not quite sure of what i understood.
Does a hard link sort of copy the file to a new name, give it the same inode number and same rights?
What exactly should I do to do this:... (3 Replies)
Someone asked me a question today about the difference between a hard link and a soft link. That got me thinking and maybe someone can answer.
Why would I ever use a hard link if I can use a soft link instead? (2 Replies)
hello folks
how y'all doin
well i have some questions about symbolic link and hard link
hope some one answer me
i open terminal and join as root
and i wrote ln -s blah blah
then i wrote ls
i see red file called blah blah
but didn't understand what is this can some one explain and... (2 Replies)
Hello,
In unix, the normal user can't create a hardlink for a directory. why..?
Is there any difference between creating a hard link for a file and directory?
The super user can create a hard link for directories.
Why we cannot create and super user can create.?
Please, can anyone help... (1 Reply)
Hi
PLease let me know the usage of Hard Link vs Soft Link
i.e what is the basic difference and what happens when one file is changed or deleted in both the cases???
thanks (3 Replies)
Hi Experts,
Please help me out to find out difference between a hard link and a soft link.
I am new in unix plz help me with some example commands ( for creating such links).
Regards
S.Kamakshi :) (2 Replies)
Is it possible to Hard link a directory? Some people on google say it is possible and some say it is not possible. I haven't seen a working solution though. (3 Replies)
I created a file named as file and a its hard link named as hlink.
Problem is that when I delete the file , it gets deleted without notifying that hardlink exists.
But as far as I think we cannot delete the file unless we delete all the hard links pointing to it.
Is there anything worng... (1 Reply)
Discussion started by: hiten.r.chauhan
1 Replies
LEARN ABOUT LINUX
link
LINK(2) Linux Programmer's Manual LINK(2)NAME
link - make a new name for a file
SYNOPSIS
#include <unistd.h>
int link(const char *oldpath, const char *newpath);
DESCRIPTION
link() creates a new link (also known as a hard link) to an existing file.
If newpath exists it will not be overwritten.
This new name may be used exactly as the old one for any operation; both names refer to the same file (and so have the same permissions and
ownership) and it is impossible to tell which name was the "original".
RETURN VALUE
On success, zero is returned. On error, -1 is returned, and errno is set appropriately.
ERRORS
EACCES Write access to the directory containing newpath is denied, or search permission is denied for one of the directories in the path
prefix of oldpath or newpath. (See also path_resolution(7).)
EEXIST newpath already exists.
EFAULT oldpath or newpath points outside your accessible address space.
EIO An I/O error occurred.
ELOOP Too many symbolic links were encountered in resolving oldpath or newpath.
EMLINK The file referred to by oldpath already has the maximum number of links to it.
ENAMETOOLONG
oldpath or newpath was too long.
ENOENT A directory component in oldpath or newpath does not exist or is a dangling symbolic link.
ENOMEM Insufficient kernel memory was available.
ENOSPC The device containing the file has no room for the new directory entry.
ENOTDIR
A component used as a directory in oldpath or newpath is not, in fact, a directory.
EPERM oldpath is a directory.
EPERM The file system containing oldpath and newpath does not support the creation of hard links.
EROFS The file is on a read-only file system.
EXDEV oldpath and newpath are not on the same mounted file system. (Linux permits a file system to be mounted at multiple points, but
link() does not work across different mount points, even if the same file system is mounted on both.)
CONFORMING TO
SVr4, 4.3BSD, POSIX.1-2001 (but see NOTES).
NOTES
Hard links, as created by link(), cannot span file systems. Use symlink(2) if this is required.
POSIX.1-2001 says that link() should dereference oldpath if it is a symbolic link. However, since kernel 2.0, Linux does not do so: if
oldpath is a symbolic link, then newpath is created as a (hard) link to the same symbolic link file (i.e., newpath becomes a symbolic link
to the same file that oldpath refers to). Some other implementations behave in the same manner as Linux. POSIX.1-2008 changes the speci-
fication of link(), making it implementation-dependent whether or not oldpath is dereferenced if it is a symbolic link. For precise con-
trol over the treatment of symbolic links when creating a link, see linkat(2).
BUGS
On NFS file systems, the return code may be wrong in case the NFS server performs the link creation and dies before it can say so. Use
stat(2) to find out if the link got created.
SEE ALSO ln(1), linkat(2), open(2), rename(2), stat(2), symlink(2), unlink(2), path_resolution(7), symlink(7)COLOPHON
This page is part of release 3.27 of the Linux man-pages project. A description of the project, and information about reporting bugs, can
be found at http://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/.
Linux 2008-08-21 LINK(2)