What is the main advantage of creating links to a file
instead of copies of the file?

Answers were Sorted based on User's Feedback



What is the main advantage of creating links to a file instead of copies of the file?..

Answer / daniel

The main advantage is not really that it saves disk space
(though it does that too) but, rather, that a change of
permissions on the file is applied to all the link access
points. The link will show permissions of lrwxrwxrwx but
that is for the link itself and not the access to the file
to which the link points. Thus if you want to change the
permissions for a command, such as su, you only have to do
it on the original. With copies you have to find all of the
copies and change permission on each of the copies.

Is This Answer Correct ?    6 Yes 2 No

What is the main advantage of creating links to a file instead of copies of the file?..

Answer / bkoh

It is a way to allow one common copy. Most commonly used
for linking to a common configuration or library file where
the file owner or administrator will just need to make the
updates and all the users will have the same updates.

This is in contrast to every user having their own copies
and when there is a major change, every user will have to
ensure that their copies is the most updated.

Is This Answer Correct ?    3 Yes 2 No

What is the main advantage of creating links to a file instead of copies of the file?..

Answer / praveen

actually, if u have one version of dll and u dont want end
user to know abt that and when second version comes u r
changing the original file and now use the link to point
the latest version, so end user dont know abt the original
dll file.

Is This Answer Correct ?    2 Yes 2 No

What is the main advantage of creating links to a file instead of copies of the file?..

Answer / v s

File is a resource. It can be needed by n no of processes at the same time. So to avoid inconsistency, to save memory and for the ease of checking/changing the access permissions, its better to keep files linked and not to make copies.

Is This Answer Correct ?    0 Yes 0 No

What is the main advantage of creating links to a file instead of copies of the file?..

Answer / tyquan

it allows you to return to the web page without remembering
the URLs

Is This Answer Correct ?    0 Yes 1 No

Post New Answer

More Unix AllOther Interview Questions

i am prepairing for 2+ yrs exp in oracle/unix production support,can u tell me which type issue comes in server plz help

0 Answers   Crimson Logic,


What are permissions in UNIX?

5 Answers   BMC, University,


What are Profilers?

1 Answers   Axis Technologies,


What does iostat do?

4 Answers   IBM,


How do you use Unix for Backend Testing ?

1 Answers   Wipro,


What steps are required to perform a bare-metal recovery?

1 Answers  


What is an inode?

8 Answers  


How do I log into a remote Unix machine(as a root/normal user)?Please specify with command user and argument.

3 Answers  


very first process created by kernell?

4 Answers   TCS,


What is egrep?

2 Answers  


Telnet sometimes doesn't permit root logons,how will you then change a file writable only by root on a remote host?

1 Answers  


What is a level 0 backup?

2 Answers   Atos Origin,


Categories