"readlink -f foo" fails if the target of foo does not exist

[Thomas Hood]

Currently,

    readlink -f foo

returns the null string if the target of foo does not exist.  This behavior
differs from that of readlink in Debian woody.  I hope that this will be
considered a bug because the new behavior is much less useful than the old
behavior.  The new behavior can easily be emulated using the old readlink:

    REALPATH="$(old-readlink -f "$FILE")"
    [ -e "$REALPATH" ] || REALPATH=""

but the old behavior cannot easily be emulated using the new readlink.
With the new readlink there is no easy way to find out the ultimate
target of a symlink chain if the target happens not to exist.

Please cc me and address@hidden in replies.
--
Thomas Hood