https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symbolic_link
On Mon, Sep 22, 2014 at 4:53 PM, Russell Senior <[email protected]> wrote: > On Mon, Sep 22, 2014 at 4:43 PM, Nathan McCorkle <[email protected]> wrote: > >> A symlink is basically a shortcut file that points to another file. My >> basic understanding is when a symlink is removed, the real file isn't >> touched, but if you use a hardlink to make the shortcut, if you remove >> the hardlink the real file also gets removed. > > Removing the hardlink does not remove the real file, unless it is the > last link to the "real file" (or inode). > > A symlink is the file system holding a name that redirects to the > other filename. The other filename doesn't even need to exist. > > A hard link is just another name that points at the inode. The inode > is the filesystem object that holds the content of the file. The > inode keeps a reference count, when it goes to zero (or something like > that) the inode releases the blocks associated with the content of the > file. There is no hierachy in hardlinks, one is treated the same as > any other. You can create a hardlink to a file and then remove the > original filename and the hardlink survives. The ls -l command will > show you the reference count associated with a file. _______________________________________________ dorkbotpdx-blabber mailing list [email protected] http://music.columbia.edu/mailman/listinfo/dorkbotpdx-blabber
