what is symbolic link in unix ???
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Answer / renjith
Symbolic(Soft) link is not a real file , just a link to
another file. It allows giving another name to a file
without duplicates it. Its advantage is - Save Memory Space.
To create a symbolic link. ln -s extisting_file des_file
| Is This Answer Correct ? | 32 Yes | 3 No |
Linux has two kinds of file system links: symbolic links and
hard links.
A symbolic link — also called a soft link or symlink —
resembles a Windows shortcut. A symlink is a little file
that contains the pathname of another object on the
filesystem: a file, a directory, a socket, and so on —
possibly even the pathname of another link. This pathname
can be absolute or relative. To make a symlink, use ln with
the -s option. Give the name of the target first, then the
name of the link.
# ln –s existing-file-name link-name
We can still edit the original file by opening the symbolic
link, and changes we make doing that will "stick." But if we
delete the symbolic link, it has no impact on the original
file at all. If we move or rename the original file, the
symbolic link is "broken," it continues to exist but it
points at nothing.
A hard link isn’t itself a file. Instead, it’s a directory
entry. It points to another file using the file’s inode
number. Means both have same inode number. Any changes to
the original file will get reflected in the link file also
as both are same.
# ln existing-file-name link-name
To give a file more than one name or to make the same file
appear in multiple directories, you can make links to that
file instead of copying it. One advantage of this is that a
link takes little or even no disk space. Another is that, if
you edit the target of the link, those changes can be seen
immediately through the link.
| Is This Answer Correct ? | 17 Yes | 0 No |
Answer / sunil
A symbolic link — also called a soft link or symlink —
resembles a Windows shortcut. A symlink is a little file
that contains the pathname of another object on the
filesystem: a file, a directory, a socket, and so on —
possibly even the pathname of another link. This pathname
can be absolute or relative. To make a symlink, use ln with
the -s option. Give the name of the target first, then the
name of the link.
# ln –s existing-file-name link-name
We can still edit the original file by opening the symbolic
link, and changes we make doing that will "stick." But if we
delete the symbolic link, it has no impact on the original
file at all. If we move or rename the original file, the
symbolic link is "broken," it continues to exist but it
points at nothing.
A hard link isn’t itself a file. Instead, it’s a directory
entry. It points to another file using the file’s inode
number. Means both have same inode number. Any changes to
the original file will get reflected in the link file also
as both are same.
# ln existing-file-name link-name
To give a file more than one name or to make the same file
appear in multiple directories, you can make links to that
file instead of copying it. One advantage of this is that a
link takes little or even no disk space. Another is that, if
you edit the target of the link, those changes can be seen
immediately through the link.
| Is This Answer Correct ? | 16 Yes | 0 No |
Answer / pritesh
symbolic link is an alias of the existing file/folder. it
can be hard link or shoft link
| Is This Answer Correct ? | 18 Yes | 13 No |
Answer / prince udirmaan deka
As we know that there are three file system in the UNIX. They are Ordinary File, Device File and Directory File. The fourth file is Symbolic File. Like unlike Hard Links, they don't stored any content but provides the pathname of the file. Symbolic Links are sometime often called as Soft links.
The ln command is used to create soft link with -s option.
For example:-
$ ln ln -s note note.sys
$ ls -il note note.sys
12345 rwx_wx_w_ Kumar 2 metal grp 12 feb 22 12:23 note
12346 lrw_rwxr_x Kumar 2 metal grp 10 mar 12 16:00 note.sys->
From the above example we can see two expressions:-
1) l(el):identifies the permission of the file.
2) ->(pointer): provide path name to the file note.
In soft link, we can see that inode number is different for each file.
It is important to realize that if we delete the file note.sym, then we recreate link easily. But if note file is deleted then would lose the content of data. In that case, note.sys points to non- existent file and becomes dangling pointer.
| Is This Answer Correct ? | 0 Yes | 0 No |
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