I need a command to know if a file is linking to another file

Question

How I can know if file1 is a symbolic link to a file2? I need an if condition.

score 3 · Answer 1 · edited Jun 05 '22 at 09:24

3

You can use the -h test to determine whether a file is a symbolic link, and -ef to check if it links to a given file (note that -ef isn’t specified by POSIX):

if [ -h file1 ] && [ file1 -ef file2 ]; then
    echo 'file1 is a symbolic link and equivalent to file2'
fi

edited Jun 05 '22 at 09:24

Kusalananda

333,661

answered Apr 25 '19 at 16:52

Stephen Kitt

434,908

I suppose both files could be two different names for the same symbolic link too, pointing to some third pathname, but that might be a too weird edge case. – Kusalananda Jun 05 '22 at 09:26

I need a command to know if a file is linking to another file

1 Answers1