Re: [Mingw-users] Re: MSYS ln -s to directory

[Keith MARSHALL]

Ralf Wildenhues wrote, quoting me:
>>   $ mkdir foo
>> 
>>   $ ln foo bar
>>   ln: `foo': hard link not allowed for directory
>
> I believe you will have trouble finding a unixy system younger than
> a decade that allows hard links _from_ directories; they were a nice
> way to seriously screw a file system once (so I have been told).  So
> no, nobody going for portability should expect that to work.

During the 1990s, I ran a Venix based control system which, IIRC, did
allow hard linked directories, but didn't have symlinks; (it's long
since defunct, so I can't actually confirm this).

> Did you maybe mean that
>   mkdir foo
>   touch bar
>   ln bar foo
> also would not work (untested)?

No.  I was playing Devil's Advocate, with a view to prompting us to
consider a full gamut of possibilities.  For the record:

  $ mkdir foo
  $ touch bar
  $ ln bar foo
  ln: `foo': cannot overwrite directory

fails with MSYS `ln', just as `ln -s' does, in this same scenario.

To (hopefully) put this to bed, here's how MSYS handles various
possibilities on NTFS:

  $ ln [dir1/]file1 [dir2/]file2     ; # works -- creates hard link
  $ ln -s [dir1/]file1 [dir2/]file2  ; # works -- same as `cp -p'
  $ ln [dir1/]file dir2              ; # fails
  $ ln -s [dir1/]file dir2           ; # fails
  $ cd dir2; ln [dir1/]file ... .    ; # works -- creates hard link(s)
  $ cd dir2; ln -s [dir1/]file ... . ; # works -- same as `cp -p'
  $ ln dir1 dir2                     ; # fails
  $ ln -s dir1 dir2                  ; # fails

Any other permutations you think we should check?

Regards,
Keith.