Points to directories or folders on different local drive letters. Think carbon copy.Īlso known as directory hard link. If the target file is deleted, the data at the file link remains accessible. Points to files on the same local drive letter. If the target is deleted, then the link is broken and the file or folder is no longer accessible. Points to files or folders on the same or different drive letters. Visualized path difference between hard link and symbolic link references Since a symlink is just a virtual folder that just acts as a path to the real folder, you don’t have to worry about the symlink consuming your disk space. In those situations you can simply create a symlink in the cloud service folder so that you can sync the contents of the target folder without actually moving or copying the real folder. However, you don’t want to move the folder from its actual location or don’t want to create a copy of the folder. But there will be times when you might have a folder in some other drive you want to sync with the cloud storage service. Simply put, a symlink is nothing more than a build of the text string which lets the operating system know that it is just a path for another file or folder.įor instance, most cloud service apps you install will only sync files and folders located in their own folder. Besides files, you can also create symlinks for folders. When you create a symlink for a file, it appears as if it is the actual file when in reality it is redirecting you toward the real file in the background. They act as a virtual file or folder that links to the actual file or folder. Symbolic links are much more than a simple shortcut. When you create a shortcut for a file or folder, all you are doing is pointing it to that specific file or folder, nothing more. Let’s discuss what symbolic links are and how you can easily create them in Windows 10. However, symbolic links are much more powerful and helpful than regular shortcuts. You can think of symbolic links as the shortcuts you create in Windows. Symlinks or Symbolic Links is one of the lesser known, yet useful, features in Windows.
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