Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!csd4.milw.wisc.edu!srcsip!nic.MR.NET!umn-cs!chou
From: chou@umn-cs.CS.UMN.EDU (Hsiang Chou)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.mac
Subject: Re: Iconic links??
Message-ID: <12624@umn-cs.CS.UMN.EDU>
Date: 5 May 89 18:41:10 GMT
References: <813@aipna.ed.ac.uk>
Reply-To: chou@umn-cs.cs.umn.edu (Chih-Hsiang Chou)
Organization: CSci Dept., University of Minnesota, Mpls.
Lines: 39

In article <813@aipna.ed.ac.uk> eam@uk.ac.ed.aipna (Emilio Agustin) writes:
>
>I was wondering if anybody in the net has any idea on how to 
>make a kind of link to an application (in the UNIX(TM) style) or
>to any file in general. 
>
>The idea is to have a file of minimal size in the desktop (or wherever)
>pointing to file. When you double-click on it should behave exactly as
>if you double-click on the linked file.
>
>I would like to have links to the most used applications/files on the
>desktop for easy access. However, I can think of several uses
>for such a thing (avoiding duplications of text files, for example).
>
>Is this a cracy idea? Is it possible? How do I do it?
>
>Any ideas will be very much appreciated.
>
	I have the same needs too. Fortunately, Apple finally decides to
put this linking capability in their future version of Finder. According
to a news on the cover page of the April 25 issue of MacWeek, the Finder
in the System Release 7.0 will provide a new organizing mechanism called
"alias" which I think is the Macintosh version of the Unix "ln". The
following paragraph is what I read in the news:

	"The prototype Finder includes an organizing capability called
"aliasing". An alias is an icon that transparently references another file
or folder. When opened, this icon finds and opens the original file or
folder, mounting network servers automatically if necessary."

	Also, network services like printers and file servers will be
put into a Devices folder on the desktop analogous to Unix "/dev".
System Release 7.0 won't be available until early next year.

-- 
---
Chih-Hsiang Chou	chou@umn-cs.cs.umn.edu
Department of Computer Science
University of Minnesota