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The question of the effects of read, write and execute permissions as seen by the user of the materials accessed via the symlink, and the user of the same materials accessed directly needs to be addressed. Questions such as "If I write protect the symlink, does that write protect the content at the target of the symlink, even if the target is actually writable if accessed directly?" will be on some visitor's minds. Such as mine. :) Fyngyrz ( talk) 16:30, 22 December 2015 (UTC)
As this is Wikipedia article and not a how to, I came here looking for the history of symbolic links. While there is some talk about their use in minis (thank you), I would value more detail on the history, development and theory. But please, do not degenerate into which OS intended it first contest. Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:4898:80E0:EE43:0:0:0:2 ( talk) 16:06, 14 August 2014 (UTC)
The article currently states:
Vista has a limit of 31 symbolic links in a single path.
This implies that a directory (C:\Temp
) can only contain 31 symbolic links (e.g. C:\Temp\Dir1
, C:\Temp\Dir2
, etc.). According to
Microsoft's documentation, "[t]here is a maximum of 31 reparse points (and therefore symbolic links) allowed in a particular path." A "reparse point" is essentially a symbolic link or directory junction. As such, Windows 7 and Vista are limited to a chain of 31 symbolic links or junctions.
I believe the above quotation should be replaced with the following line:
Windows 7 and Vista support a maximum of 31 reparse points (and therefore symbolic links) for a given path.
-- 216.148.0.72 ( talk) 01:05, 30 May 2012 (UTC)
please use simple language to describe the problem. there is no need to use many foreign words. wikipedia aims to be understood by everyone not just a 'choosen few'. it would be perfect if you would use no technical english even for tech articles.
-- 212.202.37.226 17:10, 5 Jun 2005 (UTC)jan girke
On another note, It seems that vista does not have true support for symlinks: http://slashdot.org/articles/06/11/19/018256.shtml Perhaps this should be corrected in the article.
The following sections have been removed:
I don't think this is true. Symbolic links are immutable (they cannot be changed), however they can be removed and then a new symbolic link can be created in their place.
lrwxrwxrwx 1 jbailey users 4 2003-02-07 16:49 link -> file
This doesn't belong in this article.
This may be a valid point, but I question its pertinence. At the very least, it should be reworded. Unix-like systems take no such precaution: 'rmdir' operates on the directory entry and ignores its contents. Directory trees cannot usually be deleted in a single action, either. A program must recurse through the tree, deleting all of the files in a directory, then removing the directory itself.— Kbolino 01:55, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
I just learnt that Windows 2000 (and above) does support symbolic links but is not well-documented. I was researching a problem with missing files and read this article - http://shell-shocked.org/article.php?id=284 - which is fairly descriptive about how Windows works with Symbolic links. gv —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Guhanv ( talk • contribs) 12:34, 26 April 2007 (UTC).
The link to "binding" is broken
Windows does NOT support symlinks. Symlinks is defined below the OS layer and is part of the file system and is NOT a type of file. Please stop comparing shortcuts to Symlinks. Lets also stop trying to predict what will be in future shaky releases of Windows as their track record is not good.
I will correct the main article, as less time should be devoted to OSes that do NOT suppport symlinks. -- Kibbled bits 21:16, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
Can someone knowledgeable create a comparison of Windows shortcuts to symbolic links? Functionally for me at least there is no difference since they just get me to a long filename from a shorter filename on the desktop (and also start menu in windows) without typing forever or clicking through nested folders. 129.31.71.161 09:37, 2 August 2007 (UTC)
The statement that "Cygwin ... creates Windows shortcuts (.lnk files)" seems to be incorrect or outdated. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 145.94.50.9 ( talk) 15:46, 14 January 2011 (UTC)
"The misuse of soft links can be a cause extreme irritation in many subjects. Doctors report a significant increase in blood pressure, body temperature, and elevated vocal ranges. Persons with a history of heart conditions should refrain from the use of softlinks without first consulting with their physician."
What does this have to do with softlinks? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.197.165.133 ( talk) 06:55, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
So can anyone decisively explain the differences between filenames, shortcuts, hard and symbolic links, and the data they represent? — Nahum Reduta 05:10, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
Why was the concept of symbolic links invented when there is already the concept of hard links? -- Abdull ( talk) 18:49, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
Note that Windows Shortcuts may contain a relative path, or an incomplete path. I don't want to see a full explanation of Windows Shortcuts here, just to avoid subtle technical errors. 218.214.18.240 ( talk) 05:25, 5 September 2010 (UTC)
In the intro it is claimed that symbolic links were already present in 1978 in mini computer OSs from DEC. I knew one of them ( RT-11) quite well and it did not have symbolic links on the file system level. The latest versions of RT-11 knew something like command aliases, but no symbolic links.
I never used the other mini computer OS RSTS (also created by DEC), but according to the RSTS page it was similar to RT-11.
I think the claim should be modified.
Treutwein ( talk) 09:35, 24 January 2011 (UTC)
Windows shortcuts maintain their connection even when the target is moved, unlike symbolic links. Windows XP will search for a broken link's target before offering to delete it. This isn't "shortcuts maintaining their connection", this is Windows attempting to repair them on an ad-hoc basis. Do newer versions of Windows do something more advanced? From the first sentence it sounds like Windows is keeping track of what shortcuts refer to a file, and then update these shortcuts when a file is moved. This is clearly not XP's behavior. Should be reworded. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 194.237.142.20 ( talk) 04:47, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
OS/2 does indeed support symlinks (not hardlinks) via extended attributes. These work on HPFS and JFS volumes, though I am not sure of FAT volumes, as EAs are stored differently. The reading and proper interpretation of such symlink data is dependent upon the application, however. Linux applications, ported using GCC, for the most part understand symlinks perfectly well.
The section pertaining to OS/2 as it now stands is completely irrelevant, as WPS shadows are not symlinks of any sort, as they have nothing to do with the filesystem whatsoever, and are only understood by the WPS. I suggest removing this mention entirely or at least referencing it in the context of WPS constructs. I am happy to provide language to re-work the OS/2 section. LewisR ( talk) 23:11, 8 January 2012 (UTC)
A directory is a special type of file, so the many references to "file or directory" and variations thereof could be replaced by simply "file" for brevity. l0b0 ( talk) 10:44, 7 August 2012 (UTC)
The Overview sub-section is not exclusively about Windows, so it should be moved out of the Microsoft Windows section. l0b0 ( talk) 11:24, 7 August 2012 (UTC)
![]() | This article is rated C-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | |||||||||||||
|
![]() | This article is based on material taken from the Free On-line Dictionary of Computing prior to 1 November 2008 and incorporated under the "relicensing" terms of the GFDL, version 1.3 or later. |
The question of the effects of read, write and execute permissions as seen by the user of the materials accessed via the symlink, and the user of the same materials accessed directly needs to be addressed. Questions such as "If I write protect the symlink, does that write protect the content at the target of the symlink, even if the target is actually writable if accessed directly?" will be on some visitor's minds. Such as mine. :) Fyngyrz ( talk) 16:30, 22 December 2015 (UTC)
As this is Wikipedia article and not a how to, I came here looking for the history of symbolic links. While there is some talk about their use in minis (thank you), I would value more detail on the history, development and theory. But please, do not degenerate into which OS intended it first contest. Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:4898:80E0:EE43:0:0:0:2 ( talk) 16:06, 14 August 2014 (UTC)
The article currently states:
Vista has a limit of 31 symbolic links in a single path.
This implies that a directory (C:\Temp
) can only contain 31 symbolic links (e.g. C:\Temp\Dir1
, C:\Temp\Dir2
, etc.). According to
Microsoft's documentation, "[t]here is a maximum of 31 reparse points (and therefore symbolic links) allowed in a particular path." A "reparse point" is essentially a symbolic link or directory junction. As such, Windows 7 and Vista are limited to a chain of 31 symbolic links or junctions.
I believe the above quotation should be replaced with the following line:
Windows 7 and Vista support a maximum of 31 reparse points (and therefore symbolic links) for a given path.
-- 216.148.0.72 ( talk) 01:05, 30 May 2012 (UTC)
please use simple language to describe the problem. there is no need to use many foreign words. wikipedia aims to be understood by everyone not just a 'choosen few'. it would be perfect if you would use no technical english even for tech articles.
-- 212.202.37.226 17:10, 5 Jun 2005 (UTC)jan girke
On another note, It seems that vista does not have true support for symlinks: http://slashdot.org/articles/06/11/19/018256.shtml Perhaps this should be corrected in the article.
The following sections have been removed:
I don't think this is true. Symbolic links are immutable (they cannot be changed), however they can be removed and then a new symbolic link can be created in their place.
lrwxrwxrwx 1 jbailey users 4 2003-02-07 16:49 link -> file
This doesn't belong in this article.
This may be a valid point, but I question its pertinence. At the very least, it should be reworded. Unix-like systems take no such precaution: 'rmdir' operates on the directory entry and ignores its contents. Directory trees cannot usually be deleted in a single action, either. A program must recurse through the tree, deleting all of the files in a directory, then removing the directory itself.— Kbolino 01:55, 7 January 2006 (UTC)
I just learnt that Windows 2000 (and above) does support symbolic links but is not well-documented. I was researching a problem with missing files and read this article - http://shell-shocked.org/article.php?id=284 - which is fairly descriptive about how Windows works with Symbolic links. gv —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Guhanv ( talk • contribs) 12:34, 26 April 2007 (UTC).
The link to "binding" is broken
Windows does NOT support symlinks. Symlinks is defined below the OS layer and is part of the file system and is NOT a type of file. Please stop comparing shortcuts to Symlinks. Lets also stop trying to predict what will be in future shaky releases of Windows as their track record is not good.
I will correct the main article, as less time should be devoted to OSes that do NOT suppport symlinks. -- Kibbled bits 21:16, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
Can someone knowledgeable create a comparison of Windows shortcuts to symbolic links? Functionally for me at least there is no difference since they just get me to a long filename from a shorter filename on the desktop (and also start menu in windows) without typing forever or clicking through nested folders. 129.31.71.161 09:37, 2 August 2007 (UTC)
The statement that "Cygwin ... creates Windows shortcuts (.lnk files)" seems to be incorrect or outdated. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 145.94.50.9 ( talk) 15:46, 14 January 2011 (UTC)
"The misuse of soft links can be a cause extreme irritation in many subjects. Doctors report a significant increase in blood pressure, body temperature, and elevated vocal ranges. Persons with a history of heart conditions should refrain from the use of softlinks without first consulting with their physician."
What does this have to do with softlinks? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.197.165.133 ( talk) 06:55, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
So can anyone decisively explain the differences between filenames, shortcuts, hard and symbolic links, and the data they represent? — Nahum Reduta 05:10, 2 December 2007 (UTC)
Why was the concept of symbolic links invented when there is already the concept of hard links? -- Abdull ( talk) 18:49, 7 August 2008 (UTC)
Note that Windows Shortcuts may contain a relative path, or an incomplete path. I don't want to see a full explanation of Windows Shortcuts here, just to avoid subtle technical errors. 218.214.18.240 ( talk) 05:25, 5 September 2010 (UTC)
In the intro it is claimed that symbolic links were already present in 1978 in mini computer OSs from DEC. I knew one of them ( RT-11) quite well and it did not have symbolic links on the file system level. The latest versions of RT-11 knew something like command aliases, but no symbolic links.
I never used the other mini computer OS RSTS (also created by DEC), but according to the RSTS page it was similar to RT-11.
I think the claim should be modified.
Treutwein ( talk) 09:35, 24 January 2011 (UTC)
Windows shortcuts maintain their connection even when the target is moved, unlike symbolic links. Windows XP will search for a broken link's target before offering to delete it. This isn't "shortcuts maintaining their connection", this is Windows attempting to repair them on an ad-hoc basis. Do newer versions of Windows do something more advanced? From the first sentence it sounds like Windows is keeping track of what shortcuts refer to a file, and then update these shortcuts when a file is moved. This is clearly not XP's behavior. Should be reworded. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 194.237.142.20 ( talk) 04:47, 30 June 2011 (UTC)
OS/2 does indeed support symlinks (not hardlinks) via extended attributes. These work on HPFS and JFS volumes, though I am not sure of FAT volumes, as EAs are stored differently. The reading and proper interpretation of such symlink data is dependent upon the application, however. Linux applications, ported using GCC, for the most part understand symlinks perfectly well.
The section pertaining to OS/2 as it now stands is completely irrelevant, as WPS shadows are not symlinks of any sort, as they have nothing to do with the filesystem whatsoever, and are only understood by the WPS. I suggest removing this mention entirely or at least referencing it in the context of WPS constructs. I am happy to provide language to re-work the OS/2 section. LewisR ( talk) 23:11, 8 January 2012 (UTC)
A directory is a special type of file, so the many references to "file or directory" and variations thereof could be replaced by simply "file" for brevity. l0b0 ( talk) 10:44, 7 August 2012 (UTC)
The Overview sub-section is not exclusively about Windows, so it should be moved out of the Microsoft Windows section. l0b0 ( talk) 11:24, 7 August 2012 (UTC)