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SYMLINK(2) System Calls Manual SYMLINK(2)

symlink, symlinkat — make symbolic link to a file

#include <unistd.h>

int
symlink(const char *name1, const char *name2);

#include <fcntl.h>
#include <unistd.h>

int
symlinkat(const char *name1, int fd, const char *name2);

A symbolic link name2 is created to name1 (name2 is the name of the file created, name1 is the string used in creating the symbolic link). Either name may be an arbitrary path name; the files need not be on the same file system, and the file specified by name1 need not exist at all.

The () function is equivalent to () except that where name2 specifies a relative path, the newly created symbolic link is created relative to the directory associated with file descriptor fd instead of the current working directory.

If () is passed the special value AT_FDCWD (defined in <fcntl.h>) in the fd parameter, the current working directory is used and the behavior is identical to a call to ().

Upon successful completion, the value 0 is returned; otherwise the value -1 is returned and the global variable errno is set to indicate the error.

The symbolic link succeeds unless:

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A component of the name2 prefix is not a directory.
[]
A component of a pathname exceeded NAME_MAX characters, or an entire pathname (including the terminating NUL) exceeded PATH_MAX bytes.
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The named file does not exist.
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A component of the name2 path prefix denies search permission.
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Too many symbolic links were encountered in translating the pathname.
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name2 already exists.
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An I/O error occurred while making the directory entry for name2, or allocating the inode for name2, or writing out the link contents of name2.
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The file name2 would reside on a read-only file system.
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The directory in which the entry for the new symbolic link is being placed cannot be extended because there is no space left on the file system containing the directory.
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The new symbolic link cannot be created because there is no space left on the file system that will contain the symbolic link.
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There are no free inodes on the file system on which the symbolic link is being created.
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The directory in which the entry for the new symbolic link is being placed cannot be extended because the user's quota of disk blocks on the file system containing the directory has been exhausted.
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The new symbolic link cannot be created because the user's quota of disk blocks on the file system that will contain the symbolic link has been exhausted.
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The user's quota of inodes on the file system on which the symbolic link is being created has been exhausted.
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An I/O error occurred while making the directory entry or allocating the inode.
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name1 or name2 points outside the process's allocated address space.

Additionally, symlinkat() will fail if:

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The name2 argument specifies a relative path and the fd argument is neither AT_FDCWD nor a valid file descriptor.
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The name2 argument specifies a relative path and the fd argument is a valid file descriptor but it does not reference a directory.
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The name2 argument specifies a relative path but search permission is denied for the directory which the fd file descriptor references.

ln(1), link(2), readlink(2), unlink(2), symlink(7)

The symlink() and symlinkat() functions conform to IEEE Std 1003.1-2008 (“POSIX.1”).

The symlink() system call first appeared in 4.1cBSD. The symlinkat() system call has been available since OpenBSD 5.0.

September 10, 2015 OpenBSD-6.5