links (hard links and soft links..)

sachitha · 08-10-2005, 12:36 PM

i am not clear about these links that u get in Unix OS.
is it correct to say that when the original file is deleted , the data can still be accessed through a hard link..? and does it have the same i-node no:?
is the softlink a file containing relative path or absolute path to the original file??
what exactly are the differeces between hard and soft links in the above aspects????

jtshaw · 08-10-2005, 01:10 PM

A hard link basically assigns another physical pointer to the same piece of data. This creates a limitation as it requires that the data be on the same logical disk as the link pointers location is designated by the inode of the data.

A softlink is basically a file that contains the absolute path of the file it is pointing to. The file system tools simply know to follow the link in the file. This allows us to link across the system.