Experiments with symbolic links in unix

How to create a symbolic link from one file to another

To create a symbolic link from

	fileA -> fileB

enter the following commands... (note, this example assumes fileB doesn't exist yet... if it does, simply skip the first command).

	touch fileB	
	ln -s fileB fileA

To create a symbolic link from

	dirA -> dirB

enter the following commands... (note, this example assumes dirB doesn't exist yet... if it does, simply skip the first command)

	mkdir dirB
	ln -s dirB dirA

To break a symbolic link of

	fileA -> fileB

use

	rm fileA

Note: fileB will remain untouched.

To break a symbolic link of

	dirA -> dirB

use

	rm -rf dirA

Note: dirB will remain completely untouched.

Does Java's File.isDirectory() and File.isFile() still work when called on a symbolic link? The answer to this is... yes... it does.