Linux

9.2    Links

Links are references to files or directories. They allow you to access the same file from different locations in the directory structure without having to physically store that file multiple times. Links are thus an important tool for avoiding redundancies. In the Linux file system, links are particularly common in /bin and /lib directories. For example, take a look at the result of the ls -l /usr/bin command.

The easiest way to understand links is to use an example. Let’s suppose there is a file named abc in the test directory; the ln abc xyz command apparently creates a new file named xyz. But in reality, abc and xyz are just two references to one and the same file. The only way to check this is to use the ls command using the ...