first some examples that look fine ... these all output the same thing: realpath --relative-to=/usr /usr/bin realpath --relative-to=/usr/ /usr/bin realpath --relative-to=/usr /usr/bin/ realpath --relative-to=/usr/ /usr/bin/ which is to say, they show: bin as does these: realpath --relative-to=/usr/bin /usr realpath --relative-to=/usr/bin/ /usr realpath --relative-to=/usr/bin /usr/ realpath --relative-to=/usr/bin/ /usr/ which is to say, they show: .. as does these: realpath --relative-to=/ /usr realpath --relative-to=/ /usr/ which is to say, they show: .. however, if the last argument is just the root path: realpath --relative-to=/usr / realpath --relative-to=/usr/ / we end up with a trailing slash: ../ for consistency, i don't think that should be the case (reported by Ulrich Müller via https://bugs.gentoo.org/398339) -mike