Unix - Symbolic links

A symbolic link or soft link is very much like a shortcut in Windows. Unlike a hard link, a symbolic link does not contain the data in the target file, and instead points to another file in the system.

• Let's create a hard link of new directory as the source file
  # mkdir /usr/test
  


• Let's create a symbolic link  
  # ln -s /usr/test/ /test        ( # ln –s sourceFile symbolicLinkFile )
  


• # ls –al /
  …
  lrwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel       10 Sep 25 11:18     test -> /usr/test/
  …
  


• # touch /usr/test/sample.txt
  


• # ls /test
  sample.txt
  
  Note: sample.txt IS listed.
  


• # ls -al /test
  lrwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel  10 Sep 25 11:18 /test -> /usr/test/
  
  Note: sample.txt IS NOT listed during detailed listing.
  


• # ls -al /usr/test/
  total 6
  drwxr-xr-x   2 root  wheel  512 Sep 25 11:21 .
  drwxr-xr-x  18 root  wheel  512 Sep 25 11:18 ..
  -rwxr-xr-x   1 root  wheel   61 Sep 25 11:22 sample.txt
  


• # touch /test/sample2.txt
  


• # ls -al /test
  lrwxr-xr-x  1 root  wheel  10 Sep 25 11:18 /test -> /usr/test/
  
  Note: sample2.txt is NOT listed either.
  


• # ls /test
  sample.txt       sample2.txt
  


• # rm /test
  
  Note: Symbolic link is deleted without any complain about files within directory
  


• # ls /usr/test/
  sample.txt       sample2.txt
  


• # rm /usr/test
  rm: /usr/test: is a directory