On Thu, 8 Jul 1999, mike montgomery wrote:
>
> Axalon wrote:
> >
> > It went into linux-2.2.9/ do it again and check there you will see a
> > linux/linux broken symlink, Because of the symlink being a directory
> > it thinks you want a symlink in the directory
> >
>
> Okay, I'll try that (after all, I should be able to reproduce any time).
>
>
> > This is the way it is supposed to work on directories, try it with a file
> > and it will work as you are expecting.
>
> Okay, is there a specific reason for this, that you would care to share
> ?
> (I mean, at first glance it doesn't look very obvious, does it ???)
>
No clue really, it's not my code. At least it's consistant
> Even then, shouldn't there be a difference between _hard_ links (where
> AFAIK there are use counters to maintain) and _symbolic_ links, where
> there are no such counters so you can safely clear the inode every time
> ?
I think yu answered your own question here, Yes there are substanial
differences between a sym and hard link, as to counters and inodes
please don't make me read the code fs code again thats a little more then
i want to know about my file system ;)
> I quote from Unix unleashed third edition(nice book just don't drop it
> on your toe)
>
> "With hard links ,the original filename and the linked filename point to
> the same physical address and are absolutely identical. There are two
> important limitations of a hard link. A directory cannot have a hard link ,
> and it cannot cross a file system. It is possible to delete the original
> filename without deleting the linked filename. Under such circumstances,
> the file is not deleted, but the directory entry of the original file is
> deleted, and the link count is decremented by 1. The data blocks of the
> file are deleted when the link count becomes zero.
>
> With symbolic links there are two files: one is the original file, and the
> other is the linked filename containing the name of the original file. An
> important limitation of the symbolic link is that you may remove the
> original file, and it will cause the linked filename to be there, but
> without any data. However, a symbolic linked filename can cross file systems.
>
> Be careful about symbolic links. If you are not, you will be left with
> files that do not point anywhere because the original file has been deleted
> or renamed.An important feature of the symbolic link is that it can be used
> to link directories as well as files. "
>
>
