Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!husc6!cmcl2!brl-adm!brl-smoke!gwyn From: gwyn@brl-smoke.ARPA (Doug Gwyn ) Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards Subject: Re: symbolic links Message-ID: <6035@brl-smoke.ARPA> Date: Sun, 28-Jun-87 22:01:19 EDT Article-I.D.: brl-smok.6035 Posted: Sun Jun 28 22:01:19 1987 Date-Received: Mon, 29-Jun-87 01:38:19 EDT References: > <2211@bunker.UUCP> <1097@mtune.ATT.COM> <1101@mtune.ATT.COM> <6837@beta.UUCP> Reply-To: gwyn@brl.arpa (Doug Gwyn (VLD/VMB) ) Organization: Ballistic Research Lab (BRL), APG, MD. Lines: 15 Keywords: symbolic links, Multics In article <6837@beta.UUCP> hwe@beta.UUCP (Skip Egdorf) writes: >My two cents worth is: Don't try to put hard-link semantics onto >symbolic links, and don't try to put symbolic-link semantics onto >hard links. They are both needed concepts. Another evaluation might be: "Whenever two similar but different ways of doing a task are implemented on the same system, semantic problems occur where their domains overlap." It seems that symlinks were an attempt to overcome the restriction against linking across different mounted file systems. Surely some other approach fully compatible with hard links could have been found. If it had, then Korn's ".." interpretation would still be operative for whatever approach might have been adopted, just as it already is for the root of a mounted filesystem.