Practical Linux

Creating Symbolic Links

Symbolic links are convenient shortcuts used to link existing files or directories to files or directories with more convenient locations or names. By default, a number of symbolic links are created when Linux is installed:

• Various shells listed under the /bin directory, such as bsh, csh, and sh, are actually symbolic links to other shells, such as bash or tcsh.

• The computer's modem device can be a link to /dev/modem instead of /dev/cua1 or /dev/ttyS1.

• The ex and vi editors are links to the vim text editor.

Linking Files with the ln Command

There are times when you find that it is convenient to have more than one path to the same file. Say that you want to easily be able to execute an application from anywhere, without typing ...