5

Let's suppose I have one file and one directory:

$ ls -l
total 4
drwxrwxr-x. 2 user user 4096 Oct  8 09:53 dir
-rw-rw-r--. 1 user user    0 Oct  8 09:53 file

I created a symlink to file called symlink1, and a symlink to dir called dirslink1:

$ ls -l
drwxrwxr-x. 2 user user 4096 Oct  8 09:53 dir
lrwxrwxrwx. 1 user user    3 Oct  8 10:03 dirslink1 -> dir
-rw-rw-r--. 5 user user    0 Oct  8 09:53 file
lrwxrwxrwx. 1 user user    4 Oct  8 09:53 symlink1 -> file

Now I created symlinks to symlink1 using ln -s and ln -sL:

$ ln -s symlink1 symlink2
$ ln -sL symlink1 symlink3
$ ln -s dirslink1 dirslink2
$ ln -sL dirslink1 dirslink3

Now, as far as I understand, symlink3 should point to file and dirslink3 should point to dir. But when I check it, none of the symlink[23] and dirslink[23] points to the original file or dir:

$ ls -l
drwxrwxr-x. 2 user user 4096 Oct  8 09:53 dir
lrwxrwxrwx. 1 user user    3 Oct  8 10:03 dirslink1 -> dir
lrwxrwxrwx. 1 user user    9 Oct  8 10:03 dirslink2 -> dirslink1
lrwxrwxrwx. 1 user user    9 Oct  8 10:03 dirslink3 -> dirslink1
-rw-rw-r--. 5 user user    0 Oct  8 09:53 file
lrwxrwxrwx. 1 user user    4 Oct  8 09:53 symlink1 -> file
lrwxrwxrwx. 1 user user    8 Oct  8 09:54 symlink2 -> symlink1
lrwxrwxrwx. 1 user user    8 Oct  8 09:54 symlink3 -> symlink1

The question is: Is it possible/How do I create a symlink to the original file using another symlink?

wjandrea
  • 658
mrc02_kr
  • 2,003

2 Answers2

10

-L only works with hard links; as specified in POSIX:

If the -s option is specified, the -L and -P options shall be silently ignored.

If you have readlink you can use that:

ln -s -- "$(readlink symlink1)" symlink4

If your readlink supports the -f option, you can use that to fully canonicalise the target (i.e. resolve all symlinks in the target’s path, if the target symlink includes other symlinks).

Stéphane Chazelas
  • 544,893
Stephen Kitt
  • 434,908
5

You can use cp -P to make a copy of a symlink:

cp -P symlink2 symlink3

(assuming symlink3 doesn't already exist as a directory or symlink to directory, see the -T option with GNU cp for those cases).

Beware that if the target of the symlink is relative, the above would probably result in a broken link if the copy is not in the same directory as the original.

With zsh, 

ln -s -- symlink2(:P) symlink3

Would create symlink3 as a symlink to the full canonical (symlink-free) path of symlink2, like ln -s -- "$(readlink -f symlink2)" symlink3 but more reliable in that it would still work correctly if that path ended in newline characters.

Same caveat as above and same work around with GNU ln.

Stéphane Chazelas
  • 544,893