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symlink(2) [linux man page]

SYMLINK(2)						     Linux Programmer's Manual							SYMLINK(2)

NAME
symlink - make a new name for a file SYNOPSIS
#include <unistd.h> int symlink(const char *oldpath, const char *newpath); Feature Test Macro Requirements for glibc (see feature_test_macros(7)): symlink(): _BSD_SOURCE || _XOPEN_SOURCE >= 500 || _XOPEN_SOURCE && _XOPEN_SOURCE_EXTENDED || _POSIX_C_SOURCE >= 200112L DESCRIPTION
symlink() creates a symbolic link named newpath which contains the string oldpath. Symbolic links are interpreted at run time as if the contents of the link had been substituted into the path being followed to find a file or directory. Symbolic links may contain .. path components, which (if used at the start of the link) refer to the parent directories of that in which the link resides. A symbolic link (also known as a soft link) may point to an existing file or to a nonexistent one; the latter case is known as a dangling link. The permissions of a symbolic link are irrelevant; the ownership is ignored when following the link, but is checked when removal or renam- ing of the link is requested and the link is in a directory with the sticky bit (S_ISVTX) set. If newpath exists it will not be overwritten. 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 one of the directories in the path prefix of newpath did not allow search permission. (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 newpath. ENAMETOOLONG oldpath or newpath was too long. ENOENT A directory component in newpath does not exist or is a dangling symbolic link, or oldpath is the empty string. 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 newpath is not, in fact, a directory. EPERM The file system containing newpath does not support the creation of symbolic links. EROFS newpath is on a read-only file system. CONFORMING TO
SVr4, 4.3BSD, POSIX.1-2001. NOTES
No checking of oldpath is done. Deleting the name referred to by a symlink will actually delete the file (unless it also has other hard links). If this behavior is not desired, use link(2). SEE ALSO
ln(1), lchown(2), link(2), lstat(2), open(2), readlink(2), rename(2), symlinkat(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 2010-09-20 SYMLINK(2)

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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
EXDEV oldpath and newpath are not on the same filesystem. EPERM The filesystem containing oldpath and newpath does not support the creation of hard links. EFAULT oldpath or newpath points outside your accessible address space. EACCES Write access to the directory containing newpath is not allowed for the process's effective uid, or one of the directories in old- path or newpath did not allow search (execute) permission. ENAMETOOLONG oldpath or newpath was too long. ENOENT A directory component in oldpath or newpath does not exist or is a dangling symbolic link. ENOTDIR A component used as a directory in oldpath or newpath is not, in fact, a directory. ENOMEM Insufficient kernel memory was available. EROFS The file is on a read-only filesystem. EEXIST newpath already exists. EMLINK The file referred to by oldpath already has the maximum number of links to it. ELOOP Too many symbolic links were encountered in resolving oldpath or newpath. ENOSPC The device containing the file has no room for the new directory entry. EPERM oldpath is a directory. EIO An I/O error occurred. NOTES
Hard links, as created by link, cannot span filesystems. Use symlink if this is required. CONFORMING TO
SVr4, SVID, POSIX, BSD 4.3, X/OPEN. SVr4 documents additional ENOLINK and EMULTIHOP error conditions; POSIX.1 does not document ELOOP. X/OPEN does not document EFAULT, ENOMEM or EIO. 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
symlink(2), unlink(2), rename(2), open(2), stat(2), ln(1) Linux 2.0.30 1997-12-10 LINK(2)
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