Determine a file with the most Hard-Links

Question

i got a homework today. Can u help me guys?

"Determine on any PC pool that hosts regular file on the local file system root who has the most hard links! Avoid doing a search of the user home directories or other NFS mounted directories. Type a file name of an regular file, the number of hard links, and a command that you could have a look at all the name of this file!"

With best regards! Marko

/ is the home directory of some system users on many systems. So that assignment is bit confusing. What's a PC pool? — Stéphane Chazelas, Dec 02 '14 at 10:48
Yeap, i guess we use all the same Home directory. Just everybody gots his account (example: pool14:/home/myusername> — Marko, Dec 02 '14 at 10:57

Hauke Laging · Answer 1 · 2014-12-02T11:05:04.823

0

file with most hardlinks

You can use the commands

find with the (GNU?) option -xdev, and the command -printf and its directives %n and %p
sort -rn
head -n 1

Of course, there may be different files (inodes) with the same number of hardlinks. If finding one of them is not enough then the solution becomes more complicated.

finding the other paths to a file / inode

You can use the command find with the option -xdev, and the test -samefile.

edited Dec 02 '14 at 11:05

answered Dec 02 '14 at 10:56

Hauke Laging

90,279

So is that the way i can do it in Xterm? Sorry, im still total new to unix/linux. :S – Marko Dec 02 '14 at 11:16
1

Yes, these commands are run in a shell like the one running in xterm. Hard to believe that you get such homework without being familiar with the basics. – Hauke Laging Dec 02 '14 at 11:28
It´s never late to learn something new! :) But, thx for the answer, it works :) – Marko Dec 02 '14 at 11:39

Determine a file with the most Hard-Links

1 Answers1