xref: /freebsd-14.2/lib/libc/sys/link.2 (revision fffcbbcd)
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32.\"     @(#)link.2	8.3 (Berkeley) 1/12/94
33.\" $FreeBSD$
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35.Dd March 5, 1999
36.Dt LINK 2
37.Os
38.Sh NAME
39.Nm link
40.Nd make a hard file link
41.Sh LIBRARY
42.Lb libc
43.Sh SYNOPSIS
44.Fd #include <unistd.h>
45.Ft int
46.Fn link "const char *name1" "const char *name2"
47.Sh DESCRIPTION
48The
49.Fn link
50function call
51atomically creates the specified directory entry (hard link)
52.Fa name2
53with the attributes of the underlying object pointed at by
54.Fa name1 .
55If the link is successful: the link count of the underlying object
56is incremented;
57.Fa name1
58and
59.Fa name2
60share equal access and rights
61to the
62underlying object.
63.Pp
64If
65.Fa name1
66is removed, the file
67.Fa name2
68is not deleted and the link count of the
69underlying object is
70decremented.
71.Pp
72.Fa Name1
73must exist for the hard link to
74succeed and
75both
76.Fa name1
77and
78.Fa name2
79must be in the same file system.
80.Fa name1
81may not be a directory.
82.Sh RETURN VALUES
83Upon successful completion, a value of 0 is returned.  Otherwise,
84a value of -1 is returned and
85.Va errno
86is set to indicate the error.
87.Sh ERRORS
88.Fn Link
89will fail and no link will be created if:
90.Bl -tag -width Er
91.It Bq Er ENOTDIR
92A component of either path prefix is not a directory.
93.It Bq Er ENAMETOOLONG
94A component of either pathname exceeded 255 characters,
95or entire length of either path name exceeded 1023 characters.
96.It Bq Er ENOENT
97A component of either path prefix does not exist.
98.It Bq Er EOPNOTSUPP
99The file system containing the file named by
100.Fa name1
101does not support links.
102.It Bq Er EMLINK
103The link count of the file named by
104.Fa name1
105would exceed 32767.
106.It Bq Er EACCES
107A component of either path prefix denies search permission.
108.It Bq Er EACCES
109The requested link requires writing in a directory with a mode
110that denies write permission.
111.It Bq Er ELOOP
112Too many symbolic links were encountered in translating one of the pathnames.
113.It Bq Er ENOENT
114The file named by
115.Fa name1
116does not exist.
117.It Bq Er EEXIST
118The link named by
119.Fa name2
120does exist.
121.It Bq Er EPERM
122The file named by
123.Fa name1
124is a directory.
125.It Bq Er EXDEV
126The link named by
127.Fa name2
128and the file named by
129.Fa name1
130are on different file systems.
131.It Bq Er ENOSPC
132The directory in which the entry for the new link is being placed
133cannot be extended because there is no space left on the file
134system containing the directory.
135.It Bq Er EDQUOT
136The directory in which the entry for the new link
137is being placed cannot be extended because the
138user's quota of disk blocks on the file system
139containing the directory has been exhausted.
140.It Bq Er EIO
141An I/O error occurred while reading from or writing to
142the file system to make the directory entry.
143.It Bq Er EROFS
144The requested link requires writing in a directory on a read-only file
145system.
146.It Bq Er EFAULT
147One of the pathnames specified
148is outside the process's allocated address space.
149.El
150.Sh SEE ALSO
151.Xr readlink 2 ,
152.Xr symlink 2 ,
153.Xr unlink 2
154.Sh STANDARDS
155The
156.Fn link
157function call is expected to conform to
158.St -p1003.1-90 .
159.Sh HISTORY
160A
161.Fn link
162function call appeared in
163.At v7 .
164.Pp
165The
166.Fn link
167system call traditionally allows the super-user to link directories which
168corrupts the filesystem coherency.  This implementation no longer permits
169it.
170